The Student Room Group
Original post by lydiar98
I'm looking to apply for a chem eng degree next year and want to do some pre-reading to help with the personal statement and interviews etc. All the books for it seem to be non-fiction and difficult to understand. Anyone got any suggestions?


Go for non-fiction books on war,E.g. books based on the cold war
The wrench by primo Levi is a collection of engineering stories, I enjoyed it anyway :smile:

Tbh they probably aren't very interested in reading a list of books you've read unless you can explain how the books have influenced you in some way that's relevant to your application.
Reply 3
Original post by jontyfernz
Go for non-fiction books on war,E.g. books based on the cold war


Why?

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Looks good for some university's application status and gives them an idea that you care about the past,present and future?
Reply 5
Original post by jontyfernz
Looks good for some university's application status and gives them an idea that you care about the past,present and future?


From your experience of applying for Chem Eng at which uni?

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Original post by jneill
From your experience of applying for Chem Eng at which uni?

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Hey there IMO it was good for me and maybe its not good for the OP,its not necessarily good for chemical engineering,but good enough as a good read for the student.IF the OP does not like and nor do you don't read.Nobody is forcing you too
Reply 7
Original post by jontyfernz
Hey there IMO it was good for me and maybe its not good for the OP,its not necessarily good for chemical engineering,but good enough as a good read for the student.IF the OP does not like and nor do you don't read.Nobody is forcing you too


*not necessarily good for chemical engineering*

correct
Original post by jneill
*not necessarily good for chemical engineering*

correct


Good enough for a foreign student like me who wants to get a good read,but for chemical engineering this one is good,my friend doing his bsc chemistry recommended this http://www.amazon.com/Chemistry-Science-American-Chemical-Publication/dp/0841232482
Original post by jontyfernz
Good enough for a foreign student like me who wants to get a good read,but for chemical engineering this one is good,my friend doing his bsc chemistry recommended this http://www.amazon.com/Chemistry-Science-American-Chemical-Publication/dp/0841232482


That's probably not the best recommendation for a chemical engineering student either.
Original post by Smack
That's probably not the best recommendation for a chemical engineering student either.


Its a good read though nonetheless,problem is good non-fiction books for topics related to engineering are not available in my country and its a pain to order them.Even if I order them from US,it usually goes upto double
Reply 11
Original post by jontyfernz
Its a good read though nonetheless,problem is good non-fiction books for topics related to engineering are not available in my country and its a pain to order them.Even if I order them from US,it usually goes upto double


So stop recommending irrelevant books.

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Original post by jneill
So stop recommending irrelevant books.

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so you recommend something rather than being the judge on what's right and what's wrong.
Reply 13
Original post by jontyfernz
so you recommend something rather than being the judge on what's right and what's wrong.


I'm not a Chem Eng applicant or student. I'll let one of them suggest something. Maybe you could follow suit.

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Reply 14
Original post by lydiar98
I'm looking to apply for a chem eng degree next year and want to do some pre-reading to help with the personal statement and interviews etc. All the books for it seem to be non-fiction and difficult to understand. Anyone got any suggestions?


There ain't any chemical engineering non fiction books that would be easy to understand (I know I've looked). I would say that to help your personal statement it will be better for u to do some research on chemical engineering itself, find out the different sectors u can work in, what u can work as (not just as a chemical engineer), the current problems that industries are facing oil and gas crisis, steel crisis etc... (this will help ur personal statement a lot), recent developments in engineering like co2 capture or anything related to renewable and sustainable energy. I just completed my degree in this course and a lot lecturers always mention that students when starting lack an understanding of what chemical engineering is about and what the industries are facing at the moment.


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Reply 15
Original post by NuriaM
There ain't any chemical engineering non fiction books that would be easy to understand (I know I've looked). I would say that to help your personal statement it will be better for u to do some research on chemical engineering itself, find out the different sectors u can work in, what u can work as (not just as a chemical engineer), the current problems that industries are facing oil and gas crisis, steel crisis etc... (this will help ur personal statement a lot), recent developments in engineering like co2 capture or anything related to renewable and sustainable energy. I just completed my degree in this course and a lot lecturers always mention that students when starting lack an understanding of what chemical engineering is about and what the industries are facing at the moment.
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I also just finished the Bachelors part of my Chemical Engineering degree and would agree with this advice. You're not going to convince any admissions officer you're passionate about multi-phase fluid dynamics or calculating the drying time required to reduce water content of adsorbent bed material, because let's be honest, who is? You're best just sticking to the broad issues facing industry currently within the UK and globally, and trying to say why it interests you with relevance to what part a chemical engineer may have in it (which in reality can be almost anything).

For example, I just completed my design project looking at both designing a process to remove contaminants from natural gas found underground, which whilst being a fairly established refining process, is of importance within the UK because of the potential developments of a fracking industry. The project didn't focus solely on the technical design of the plant (which is the bread + butter definition of chemical engineering), but also on doing some simple financial analysis, assessments of the sustainable impact both to the environment and within a social context.

Other topics you can talk about are:
The recent oil & gas crisis in the North Sea and what are engineers going to do to reduce costs to still be profitable (don't do chem eng if you're still reading posts from 2012 saying how great the money/job prospects are in e&p), Carbon capture and storage (CCS), different methods of water purification that are coming about, how we are going to deal with masses of plastic waste which may not be recyclable...

My advice would be to just steer clear of talking about how much you want to work in oil and gas, because whilst it's a massive industry, the vibe i've got from university is that generally academics want you to be a bit more ambitious than just have a want to sit through a 4 year MEng hoping you're going to be earning millions on an oil rig when it really isn't what chemeng is about.

Good luck, let us know if you want anything else answered about the course!
Reply 16
Original post by Tom3211
I also just finished the Bachelors part of my Chemical Engineering degree and would agree with this advice. You're not going to convince any admissions officer you're passionate about multi-phase fluid dynamics or calculating the drying time required to reduce water content of adsorbent bed material, because let's be honest, who is? You're best just sticking to the broad issues facing industry currently within the UK and globally, and trying to say why it interests you with relevance to what part a chemical engineer may have in it (which in reality can be almost anything).

For example, I just completed my design project looking at both designing a process to remove contaminants from natural gas found underground, which whilst being a fairly established refining process, is of importance within the UK because of the potential developments of a fracking industry. The project didn't focus solely on the technical design of the plant (which is the bread + butter definition of chemical engineering), but also on doing some simple financial analysis, assessments of the sustainable impact both to the environment and within a social context.

Other topics you can talk about are:
The recent oil & gas crisis in the North Sea and what are engineers going to do to reduce costs to still be profitable (don't do chem eng if you're still reading posts from 2012 saying how great the money/job prospects are in e&p), Carbon capture and storage (CCS), different methods of water purification that are coming about, how we are going to deal with masses of plastic waste which may not be recyclable...

My advice would be to just steer clear of talking about how much you want to work in oil and gas, because whilst it's a massive industry, the vibe i've got from university is that generally academics want you to be a bit more ambitious than just have a want to sit through a 4 year MEng hoping you're going to be earning millions on an oil rig when it really isn't what chemeng is about.

Good luck, let us know if you want anything else answered about the course!


This is brilliant! Exactly what I was thinking :smile: I always find new students or 1st & 2nd year students in the course wanting to do oil and gas because, they hear it makes so much money and I always ask them if they are aware of the recent oil and gas crisis (the answer is usually no).


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Original post by Tom3211
I also just finished the Bachelors part of my Chemical Engineering degree and would agree with this advice. You're not going to convince any admissions officer you're passionate about multi-phase fluid dynamics or calculating the drying time required to reduce water content of adsorbent bed material, because let's be honest, who is? You're best just sticking to the broad issues facing industry currently within the UK and globally, and trying to say why it interests you with relevance to what part a chemical engineer may have in it (which in reality can be almost anything).

For example, I just completed my design project looking at both designing a process to remove contaminants from natural gas found underground, which whilst being a fairly established refining process, is of importance within the UK because of the potential developments of a fracking industry. The project didn't focus solely on the technical design of the plant (which is the bread + butter definition of chemical engineering), but also on doing some simple financial analysis, assessments of the sustainable impact both to the environment and within a social context.

Other topics you can talk about are:
The recent oil & gas crisis in the North Sea and what are engineers going to do to reduce costs to still be profitable (don't do chem eng if you're still reading posts from 2012 saying how great the money/job prospects are in e&p), Carbon capture and storage (CCS), different methods of water purification that are coming about, how we are going to deal with masses of plastic waste which may not be recyclable...

My advice would be to just steer clear of talking about how much you want to work in oil and gas, because whilst it's a massive industry, the vibe i've got from university is that generally academics want you to be a bit more ambitious than just have a want to sit through a 4 year MEng hoping you're going to be earning millions on an oil rig when it really isn't what chemeng is about.

Good luck, let us know if you want anything else answered about the course!


wow, u know ur stuff
here is my problem...

. I want to study chemical engineering and i was just thinking about the careers i could go onto after i graduate.so, I have a strong passion for the preservation of the environment and i was wondering if this even exsist, working for a company where i can develop processes, machines like scrubbers. or improve the quality of exsisting machines which cut down on harmful emissions. Am i deluded or does this actually exsist..

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