What I learned as a Kid I used as an Engineer: Petroleum Engineering

As part of the “Engineering My Life“ series, I am introducing the different types of engineering through simple science experiments. My hope is that one day future engineering students will think back and realize that what they learned as a kid they will use as an engineer.

I had the unique opportunity to work and live on an oil platform called Mad Dog. The platform floats in 7,000 feet of water and is anchored over 100 miles off the coast of Louisiana. My team consisted of engineers, operators, and a maintenance crew responsible for safely operating the equipment that separated the oil, water, and gas coming from underground. The facility can handle at least 80,000 barrels of oil per day. (That is a LOT of oil.)

We worked closely with a team of petroleum engineers.

What is a Petroleum Engineer? Petroleum engineers design ways to efficiently extract oil and gas from underground. They understand that oil floats on top of water and that helps them to better extract the oil from below the earth’s surface.

Density experiments are petroleum engineering for kids: Making a wave in a bottle is a simple density activity that shows how oil is less dense than water and will always float on top.

Here’s how to make a “density” wave in a bottle:

• Fill a plastic bottle halfway with water
• Put a few drops of blue food coloring in water
• Place floating objects in the bottle (We used sea creatures. You could also use pony beads.)
• Fill the bottle the rest of the way with vegetable oil
• Take super glue or a hot glue gun and seal off the lid (to prevent oily messes!)
• When the liquids settle the oil will always float on top!

Voila! Petroleum engineering preschool style! Oil always floats on water – in a bottle, in salad dressing, and even deep below the surface of the earth!

Petroleum products are everywhere! You’d be amazed at how much we use products from oil extracted from underground in our daily lives like Tupperware, wax products, crayons, nylon, jet fuel, gasoline, sunscreen, aspirin – just to name a few!

Many of these sources of oil are in remote locations that are challenging to reach so there is very much a need for petroleum engineers in the future.

To get even more information on what petroleum engineers do check out our visit to Spindletop and our visit to the Texas Energy Museum.

Mad Dog photo credit: BP files