Essay Example on My Study Objective: Petroleum Engineering

My study objective is to acquire further knowledge and understanding in the field of petroleum engineering by gaining a Master’s degree. Petroleum engineering mainly encompasses reservoir engineering, drilling engineering, and production engineering. In Iraq, crude oil is accounted for most of its GDP. Even though Iraq has the fifth-largest proven petroleum reserves in the world, only a very small percentage of these reserves have been utilized. Proven reserves aside due to the lack of modernization of exploration technologies, a substantial number of unknown reserves are yet to be exploited. And while Iraq is also the fifth-largest crude oil producer globally, due to the decades of wars, sanctions and governmental corruption, the oil infrastructure, plants, and facilities are outdated and are in great need of modernization. Natural gas is another immensely underutilized aspect of the Iraqi oil & gas industry, as over 40 percent of the natural gas in Iraq is being flared due to the lack of processing facilities and plants for the utilization of this flared gas, which consequently leads to these large amounts of gas to be wasted. And, even though Iraq is a large oil & gas producer, it lacks local talent and experts in the industry, especially in the Kurdistan region, where I am based. 

In my opinion, natural gas is the next step for energy consumption worldwide, countries like the USA, Japan, and European countries rely greatly on natural gas, and the demand keeps increasing, as natural gas is a much cleaner alternative than oil and coal. Refining and burning natural gas produce much less greenhouse gas emissions than both oil and coal, and fewer pollutants than other fossil fuels. However, flaring the produced gas and utilizing it fully, can result in a similar carbon footprint to other fossil fuels overall, for this reason, the processing of the produced gas is of vital importance.

As explained earlier, the importance of processing the gas instead of flaring, and the large quantity of untapped proven and unknown hydrocarbon reserves located in Iraq, are being greatly underutilized, due to technological limitations and the lack of local experts in the industry. And by gaining knowledge by enrolling in a master’s program, as the demand for natural gas keeps increasing, I believe I can make an impact in the natural gas sector not only locally, but globally as well. The goal is more energy, less wasted gas, and less pollution with cleaner energy.