What is “Chemical & Process Engineering”? It's popularly known as “Chemical Engineering”. How is it defined? This question will undoubtedly take the first place in the list of questions that a Chemical Engineer has to answer the most. So what exactly Chemical Engineering is? & what does a Chemical Engineer do?
Answer may not be that simple.
Chemical Engineering is a branch of engineering like all other engineering fields. And it deals with applications of Physical Sciences (e.g. Chemistry & Physics) and Life Sciences (Biology, Microbiology & Bio Chemistry) with Mathematics. So the Chemical Engineer has a very good knowledge in basic principles of Chemistry, Physics, Biology, etc.
Applications of these sciences with Mathematics to the processes of converting Raw Materials into useful products can be basically identified as Chemical Engineering.
What are these applications of sciences that can be put into processes in order to convert Raw Material into valuable products? That is the question which will immediately come next. The answer is simple and quite straight forward. These are called “Unit operations”.
Unit Operations are the basic physical operations of chemical engineering in a chemical process plant, e.g. distillation, evaporation, extraction, drying, crystallization, filtration, mixing, size separation, crushing, grinding, etc. These Unit operations which are developed from the theories of Heat & Mass transfer and Thermodynamics, combine together in a sequence and make the process that produce useful products.
So what does the Chemical Engineer do? Chemical engineer is mainly involved in designing, optimizing and maintaining processes that produce valuable products. He is capable of managing plants in order to accomplish the objective of produce the best for the least cost. In this process, Chemical Engineer concerns highly about Energy usage optimization and the environment impact that occurs with the process.
Therefore modern Chemical Engineer’s job cannot be framed just as process designing, optimizing and maintaining because it goes beyond that. Modern Chemical Engineer is also concern with pioneering valuable new materials and techniques such as Nanotechnology, fuel cells and Bio medical engineering. In addition, the Chemical Engineer requires skills and knowledge in many different areas in the process of doing a profitable business.
Chemical Engineer is mainly working in businesses that produce valuable products for Human being. In businesses, profit always come first therefore the Chemical Engineer should have a good knowledge in Engineering Economics and Marketing field when facing the challenge of producing the best quality marketable products for the lowest cost.
Chemical Engineering processes require Human resource as well as electronic devices and Computer systems in order to run the plant efficiently and conveniently. Chemical Engineer therefore requires good knowledge and skills in Computer and electronic systems and good Leadership & interpersonal skills along with management skills and experience in Human resource management.
Further, the Chemical Engineer requires many techniques for the optimization of plant operation in order to run the plant efficiently and gain higher profit for the company.
The Chemical Engineer as an Entrepreneur
Every big manufacturing company in the world has been developed around some Chemical Engineering process starting with a simple chemical reaction. (E.g. Unilever, Coca Cola) The Chemical Engineer is considered as a combination of a chemist and a Mechanical engineer, who is capable of developing a simple lab scale reaction into a large scale manufacturing plant which ultimately makes a world class business. Therefore the Chemical Engineer having a new business idea with the required knowledge and skills holds a high potential to step into the business world as an entrepreneur.
All these opportunities of a Chemical Engineer show the breadth of the scope of a modern Chemical Engineer beyond Chemical Engineering.
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