The Ambassadors for Pakistan have done it again!

Author: Heather Stanford; Published: Aug 16, 2011; Category: Classroom presentations, Education outreach, Energy, Energy Conservation, Energy Education, Energy sources, Engineering Careers, Renewable energy, Science, SPE members, Technology, Uncategorized, Volunteering; Tags: Careers, Children, Classroom Instruction, Education, Energy, energy challenges, Energy Conservation, Energy4me, Engineering, Engineering Careers, SPE, Student, Technology, Volunteer; Comments: Comments Off

For the second year in a row, the “Ambassadors for Pakistan” have made several visits in their community presenting energy awareness and making an impact! The Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) NED University Student Chapter in Karachi, Pakistan, conducted five Energy4me presentations this year in secondary schools, colleges and universities in Pakistan.

The student-run program promotes SPE and educates the surrounding schools about the oil and gas industry and the challenges facing it today.

The schools they visited

1. Abdullah Government College
2. The Fahim’s A-Levels School System
3. CharterHouse Public School
4. A.M.S.B Al-Madrast-us-Saifyat-ul-Burhaniya
5. Jinnah University For Women

Energy4me and SPE would like to express our thanks to the commitment and continued efforts of this student chapter!

Ambassadors for Pakistan Team (2009-present)

• Hernan Buijs- SPE Student Development Committee Officer (mentor, motivator, and visit sponsor)
• M Turab Mehdi – Ambassadors for Pakistan – Team Executive Head & Planner
• Tabinda Saeed – HR Manager
• Syeda Hasan- Team Manager

New presenters added this year.

• Sidra Chughtai – Presenter
• Omer Ashan – Presenter
• Shahzeb Barber – Presenter
• Eijaz Danish – Presenter
• Mufaddal Murtaza – Presenter

Energy4me encourages young industry leaders to get involved in their community by giving classroom presentations or holding educational outreach programs like the SPE NED student chapter. These presentations make a huge impact and inspire future generations!

Share with us your contributions and outreach efforts in your community that you are already making with Energy4me and email us at energyed@spe.org or read more on how you can get involved in your community!

Again, thank you to the SPE NED University Student Chapter on your continued education outreach efforts in Pakistan!

North-east schools get educated at All-Energy 2011

Author: Guest Author; Published: May 23, 2011; Category: Classroom materials, Classroom presentations, Education outreach, Energy, Energy Education, Engineering Careers, Geology, Math, Renewable energy, Science, SPE members, Technology, Uncategorized, Volunteering; Tags: Careers, Children, Classroom Instruction, Education, Energy, energy challenges, Energy4me, Engineering, Engineering Careers, School, science, SPE, Student, Teacher, Technology, Volunteer; Comments: Be the first

All-Energy hosted an Education Day at its 2011 conference Thursday 19th May to help educate local schools about a range of renewable topics.

Organised by Aberdeen Council, Aberdeenshire Council, the Energy Institute and the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) Aberdeen, the event is aimed at teachers and careers advisors to help raise awareness of the Renewable sector.

The event also hosted the final of the ‘Electrocity Challenge’ where five teams of four children from Meldrum Academy, Peterhead Academy, Mackie Academy, Turriff Academy and Mintlaw Academy went head to head in an “ElectroCity” Competition.   ElectroCity is an online game that has been developed specifically for teachers and students between years 7 and 9. Students build and manage their own virtual towns and cities, making important decisions and learning about energy generation and environmental management. Representatives from a range of businesses led round tables to provide valuable industry information to subject-specialist teachers and career guidance experts.

Colin Black, SPE CG Chairman, Aberdeen Section, said:  “This event focuses on sharing information with teachers and pupils so they are better informed about the ‘whole energy’ sector and careers within it.  This includes the ‘energy mix’ of hydrocarbons and renewable as well as the vital role the oil and gas sector plays now and in the future.

This is a global energy industry with many opportunities for young people – SPE Aberdeen aims to continue to provide background information, facts, guidance on career paths and information on how to enter the industry.  This event is a positive step towards this.” 

SPE Aberdeen, along with other hosts, provided tour guides for teachers and pupils to meet many of the businesses exhibiting at the show. 

SPE collaboration with Schools is part of the global SPE initiative http://www.energy4me.org/  and SPE volunteers will be working closely with Schools during various events throughout this next term and anyone wishing to lend support should contact the Aberdeen Section, Career Guidance Committee at CG-Aberdeen@spemail.org

Is there really such a thing as a clean energy source?

Author: Guest Author; Published: Mar 21, 2011; Category: Energy, Energy Conservation, Energy Education, Energy sources, Environment, Renewable energy, Uncategorized; Tags: Earth, Earth science, Education, Energy, energy challenges, Energy Conservation, Environment, natural gas, oil, Petroleum, Renewable, sustainability, Technology; Comments: Be the first

Guest Author – Mary Spruill, Executive Director, National Energy Education Development Project (NEED)

In my work, I am often asked if there is really any such thing as clean energy.  Every day there is a news story, a press release from a company or government agency talking about clean energy.  Even President Obama talked about clean energy in the 2011 State of the Union Speech.  In the 600 or so workshops the National Energy Education Development Project (NEED) provides for teachers each year, we field constant questions about what clean energy is and how can we define it. 

Truthfully, energy is complex.  Energy is complicated.  But there are some things about energy that are simple.  Energy cannot be created nor destroyed.  It can be transformed.  It is in that transformation that we harness the energy we use to heat and cool our homes, to generate electricity to power our houses, apartment buildings, office buildings, and factories, and to fuel our vehicles to move products and ourselves from place to place.  All of the energy we use requires that transformation to make it do work.  That’s what energy is – the ability to do work. 

The use of energy requires us to make some pretty complicated decisions.  For over 20 years, my experience with NEED and the people with whom we work has shown me that although some energy decisions may seem to be simple, they can be very complex.  Each decision must take into account economic, environmental, public perception and, often, available technologies and capabilities.  With all of this as background, is it really possible to say that there is a perfectly clean energy source?  Perhaps it is possible to say that an energy source is CLEANER than another, but saying that any energy source is clean really doesn’t tell the full story.  All energy sources have advantages and disadvantages.  That is why energy decisions require a deep understanding of energy. 

Development of oil and natural gas requires drilling into the earth on land, or below our oceans, refining and processing the oil and gas, and moving the resulting products to markets to use them. (pipeline, tanker truck, tanker ship, barge and more)  When we use oil and natural gas we burn it releasing carbon dioxide and other emissions.  Developing wind requires decisions on land use, the mining and development of materials to build wind turbines, the trucking and shipping of the components (the tower, nacelles, blades) to the site for installation and the running of power lines to be able to move the electricity generated from the wind to market.  Solar requires tools to capture the radiant and thermal energy. Photovoltaic cells are made from mined materials that must be manufactured into the solar cells we see on our houses, road-side signage, and elsewhere.  Large-scale solar takes a lot of land to produce large amounts of electricity.  Then power lines must be put in place to move that electricity too.

I often hear representatives of one energy source saying how different their energy source is from others.  In reality, some of the fundamentals are the same.  We have to move the energy we need to where we need it, electricity over power lines (needed equipment to harness the wind or the sun) or pipelines to move oil and natural gas.  That movement has an impact on the environment too.  When wind developers plan a wind farm, they often run into the same challenges that oil and gas developers deal with and that’s how best to use the land and to return it to as close to its original state as possible.  When native species of plants and animals are considered, wind, solar, geothermal, biomass, hydropower, coal, uranium, oil and natural gas, all can have an impact on local plants and animals.  So, all decisions have to take that impact into consideration during the planning process. 

Certainly, some energy sources do not have to be mined or drilled for, but the equipment needed to harness them comes from mined and drilled resources.   Some energy sources really are better for certain needs like bringing more work per unit of energy than others.  Some sources require us to overhaul our energy infrastructure like the power grid and pipelines or even the cars we choose and how we power them.  Some require us to find plenty of land to install the equipment and then the power lines to move the electricity to where we need it. 

Making a clean energy decision is making the choice, when possible, to use less energy by conserving it and being more efficient.    When you choose to turn the lights off when you leave the room, walk or carpool instead of driving alone, you choose to make the cleanest energy decision possible.  Energy – how we produce it, use it, and conserve it are based on our personal energy decisions. 

 If students in today’s classrooms can understand two things it would be, one, that all energy sources have advantages and disadvantages and that a specific energy need may be best met by one specific energy source and, two, that the decision making process requires energy knowledge, an understanding of technological capabilities, and the willingness to always look for a better way, a cleaner way, to meet our energy needs.

Learn more about energy and energy sources.

Santa Maria students place in the Santa Barbara County Science Fair!

Author: Guest Author; Published: Mar 14, 2011; Category: Classroom presentations, Energy, Energy Conservation, Energy Education, Energy sources, Engineering Careers, Environment, Science, SPE members, Technology, Volunteering; Tags: Children, Education, Energy, energy challenges, Energy Conservation, Engineering, Environment, Renewable, science, SPE, Student, sustainability, Technology, Volunteer; Comments: Be the first

Guest Authors – By Gayle Pratt and Kevin Yung, Santa Maria Section of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE)

Since 2009, The Central Coast Education Collaborative – a project of the Santa Maria Section of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) and the Oil & Gas Industry – has partnered with local high schools to provide 4-8 students with a five-week summer engineering internship. The purpose of the internship is to engage and provide students with a contextual view of how engineering is used to develop innovative solutions for “real world” problems.  SPE members of the Santa Maria Section and professionals within the Oil & Gas Industry mentor the students on a daily basis throughout the duration of the project.

In 2010, the engineering experience was shared with the students by having them design, build and test an ocean wave energy extraction device.  Secondarily, the students were asked to consider the potential environmental impact of placing the device into service.  Field testing was conducted at the Venoco Pier in Carpinteria, California used to support their offshore platforms.  Guest speakers provided the students with context for the project including:  “Alphabet Soup – The Regulatory Agencies, Codes and Permitting”.  The students were also challenged to research the field of wave energy and the market viability of their device using The Marine & Hydrokinetic Technology Database housed on the U.S. Department of Energy’s website.  The final stage of the internship required the students to prepare a presentation summarizing their project.  The students made the presentation at a number of venues – including SPE Santa Maria functions, school board meetings, energy-related conferences and established academic competitions.

The work of the students and support of the members of the Santa Maria Section of Society of Petroleum Engineers was well documented in 3 newspaper articles – most recently a 3rd place victory and a purse of $250.00 at the Santa Barbara County Science Fair.

Plans are already underway for the 2011 internship which includes expansion of students, mentors and projects as well as the opportunity for one team to secure college scholarships.

Learn more about this project or a career in engineering!

Congratulations to SPE member Belinda Wu “New Faces of Engineering” 2011 honoree!

Author: Heather Stanford; Published: Feb 21, 2011; Category: Education outreach, Energy, Energy Education, Engineering Careers, Environment, Geology, Math, Renewable energy, Science, SPE members, Technology, Volunteering; Tags: Careers, Education, Energy, energy challenges, Engineering, Engineering Careers, eWeek, Geology, Geothermal, natural gas, oil, Petroleum, SPE, Technology, Volunteer; Comments: Comments Off

This year the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) is proud to announce that Belinda Wu, an SPE member, was among the New Faces of Engineering honorees for 2011.

Each year, National Engineers Week Foundation, a coalition of engineering societies, major corporations and government agencies, asks its members to nominate colleagues 30 years old and younger for consideration as one of the New Faces of Engineering. The work of the 2011 class reflects many of the most pressing issues that engineers are endeavoring to solve on a global scale, including energy resources, infrastructure renewal, technological advancement and national security.

Belinda Wu is currently a reservoir engineer for Woodside Energy Ltd. in Perth, Australia. She is passionate about her work because it is so dynamic, facing different challenges from day to day. As a reservoir engineer in the oil and gas industry, her job involves finding and extracting hydrocarbons from reservoir rock deep below the surface of the earth. Much of the world’s energy is sourced from oil and gas, so her work involves constantly improving on technologies that will enable more hydrocarbons to be extracted in a cost effective manner. She is excited about being an engineer. She chose her career because she enjoys the thrill of solving complex problems and likes the flexibility to work on site or in the office.  Plus, working in the oil and gas industry gives her the opportunity to travel.

Wu is currently a member of the Society of Petroleum Engineers and serves on the young professionals coordinating committee in the Western Australian section. She is also a 2010 SPE regional award winner for outstanding young professional.

Wu holds a bachelor degree with honors in chemical engineering from the University of Adelaide. The petroleum engineering profession includes chemical, mechanical, civil, electrical and marine engineers, as well as those with degrees in petroleum engineering.

Read more about the New Faces of Engineering honorees for 2011 or learn more about engineering careers.