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[TroyH]

Firstly, thank you for taking the time to read my query.

I am in my final year of a Chemical Engineering undergraduate degree at Curtin University of Technology in Perth, Western Australia. I also have partially completed (but have discontinued) a degree in Applied Chemistry.

I am presently researching companies with which to apply for graduate employment upon my graduation. I have a strong interest in the concept of sustainable engineering, and would like to pursue a career working on projects that are not only technically interesting and challenging, but that also have a focus on minimising environmental impact, and also on industrial symbiosis.

Examples of the projects that interest me most, are the collaboration between DuPont and BP to produce biobutanol, ethanol from biomass with Syntech Biofuel, efforts to produce cellulosic ethanol and oil from algae, and the Biofuel from Biomass collaboration between Shell and Codexis. Unfortunately it seems that many of these technologies are still in the preliminary research stage, and I am more interested in doing plant/systems design or working in operations, than I am in working on pure research.

Thats the long, but the short of it is that I am looking for suggestions from people, of companies who are working in this field, and of possible avenues into the industry.

In addition, I would very much like to spend a few years working in Europe. My wife and I have friends and family in the UK, Norway, Sweden and Germany, so companies who have operations in these countries (UK and Norway specifically) are of particular interest.

I don't expect to find a job that fits exactly those criteria straight away, so have been focusing on petroleum companies with global operations, that have begun working in these other areas (like BP and Shell). My expectation is to start working in the hydrocarbons division, and then looking for placement on other projects within the company once I have picked up some industry experience.

I hope my question has not been lost amongst the buzz-words and my career aspirations, and would appreciate any advice/comment/information you have to offer.

Kind Regards,

Troy Holdsworth