As a Chemical Engineer, you make or improve products used in our daily lives.
Your Chemical Engineering major also can be useful in areas like law, education, publishing, finance and medicine.
Representative Job Titles and Area of Specialization
- Process Design Engineer
- Environmental Engineer
- Plant Process Engineer
- Process Safety Engineer
- Technical Sales Person
- Environmental waste management
- Chemical Plant Technical Director*
- Petroleum Engineer
- Project Engineer
- Product Engineer
- Process Safety Engineer
- Operations/production
- Material Engineer
- Chemical Engineer
- Technician
- Regulatory Affairs Engineer
- Professor/Teacher*
* See Training section
Nature of the Work
Chemical Engineers find efficient, economical and effective ways of solving problems. As a Chemical Engineering major, you might be involved in improving food processing techniques, making synthetic fibers for clothes, developing methods to produce drugs or controlling environmental problems. Job descriptions of many of the job titles listed above may be found on www.aiche.org
Places of Employment
- Manufacturing
- Design and construction
- Biotechnology firms
- Petrochemicals
- Environmental health and safety industries
- Electronics
- Advanced materials
- Agricultural industry
- Plastics industry
- Pharmaceutical companies
- Industrial supplies industry
- Cosmetic companies
- Universities and colleges
- Federal government agencies such as:
- Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
- Department of Energy (DOE)
- Local/state government
- Research institutions
- Food and beverage processing industries
Training
Many positions in Chemical Engineering may be obtained with a bachelor's degree depending on the type of coursework you completed and experience you gained as an undergrad.
Some positions in research and management require a master's degree.
If you are considering a career in teaching and research at the university level, you will need a Ph.D.
For further information and/or career counseling contact the UCR Career Center, (951) 827-3631.
Supplemental Material
The following documents may provide further ideas for exploration.
