Department of Petroleum Engineering

The Department of Petroleum Engineering aims to provide advanced teaching and research facilities to the students to enable them to create and apply innovative technologies in drilling, production and reservoir engineering as well as efficiently utilize their knowledge and skills to find solutions of any problems related to petroleum industry.

The Department of Petroleum Engineering at Indian School of Mines was established in the year 1957 to make its mark in the Oil and Gas Industries in the country. Subsequent developments, under the able guidance of a series of distinguished educators, renowned personalities from oil and gas industries and scientists, have led the department to the forefront of research and teaching in petroleum engineering. Since commencement, the Dept. has produced more than 1200 undergraduate (B.Tech) students and about 275 post graduate students which includes both M.Tech and Ph.D. The department has made its mark in the oil and gas industries in the country and presently the ex-students are occupying very senior position in different government, public sector undertakings and private organization.

Many of them are at present Director, President and Vice President of different organizations. The department has also established rapport with the institutes and universities in India and abroad. It has established such collaborative programme with universities like University of Kansas, USA, University of Alaska Fair Banks, USA, Imperial College of Science & technology, London, Heriott-Watt University, U.K., University of Miskolc, Hungary etc.

More than 300 ex-students are presently working in the senior position in countries like USA, Canada, UAE, Kuwait. Within ISM the Department attracts the top most students every year and the placement position of this Department is at present the best, that is 100%. The organization in which the graduates are absorbed are Reliance Industries Ltd., ONGC, Schlumberger, Shell, OIL, Gas Authority of India Ltd., British Gas, Halliburton Services, Essar Oil, GSPC, Cairn Energy, IOCL, Essar Oil Ltd., Baker Hughes, Reliance Energy, NIKO Resources, GEOENPRO, MECOM Ltd., etc. So far as the research activity of the Department is concerned, it has undertaken various R & D project in the area of Reservoir Engineering, Enhanced Oil Recovery, Formation Damage, Hydraulic Fracture, Applications of Polymer, Environmental assessment & impact in the Oil Industry, Drilling Fluids and the most new area that is gas Hydrates.

The Department is having highly experienced teaching faculty and the technical personnel who have got many achievements and awards in their own respective specialization area. The undergraduate course of this Department is at par with any such courses offered by universities internationally and it deals mainly the upstream operations of oil and gas industry, i.e. Drilling, Production, Transportation and Reservoir Engg.

The unique feature of the course is that the theory classes are supplemented by a compulsory practical training in the oil fields in the summer of every year. Thus the products coming out from the Department are tailor-made to suit the requirement of the industry. The recent trend towards use of computers have also made an impact towards simulation study in various oil and gas operations and as a result quite a good number of softwares have been developed indigenously which are used frequently and has been recommended to be used in the industries.

It is worth mentioning here that a good number of petroleum engineering graduates are at present working in the software industries Infosys, i-Flex Solution etc. Thus today after 45 years of its inception the Department has established itself as nationally and internationally recognized and reputed department. There are 10 laboratories containing at least 20 such equipments whose cost are varying from Rs. 2 lakhs to Rs. 45 lakhs. The other infrastructural facilities in the Department include big seminar hall, with all modern facilities of projection system, PA system etc., and departmental library containing more than 1200 books and 26 proceedings, and number of journals.