Who should apply?
This courses are designed to give geoscientists a broad training in petroleum geology, geophysics, and introduction to reservoir engineering. They provides a preparation for various types of employment as geologists, geophysicists, or more specialist roles such as petrophysicist, basin analysts and development / operations geologists.
The courses traditionally attract students from a wide variety of backgrounds, both from the UK and overseas. They cater for recently graduated geoscientists and those with experience of working in the petroleum industry who wish to retrain or acquire additional qualifications.
The new course structure is designed to offer training for students aiming to work in either an exploration or development/appraisal role. Both courses would be suitable for general graduate entry to an oil company, and both courses teach a similar broad range of fundamental skills.
The Petroleum Geoscience for Exploration MSc has a focus in Semester 2 on basin scale geoscience, and analysis of data to assess petroleum systems, and develop leads and traps. This course is particularly suited to graduate entry from students with a strong geosciences background.
The Reservoir Development and Production MSc focusses in Semester 2 on the development of oil and gas fields and primarily the analysis of data at the field scale. The latter course will probably also be more suited to students with a stronger engineering background.
Emphasis on Academic Excellence/Industrial Skills
The MSc course combines an emphasis on academic excellence with industrial application. Students are expected to meet rigorous academic standards and to develop key analytical expertise.
A wide range of transferable skills are taught, including numeracy, communication skills, workload and research planning, problem solving, laboratory techniques, competence in computer use and familiarity with oil industry specialist geoscience software.
Specialist instruction is provided to develop presentation skills, both oral and written, throughout the course, and students regularly present work as written reports and executive summaries in multi-media formats commonly used by the oil industry. Teamwork skills are promoted within group projects.
