Getting a summer internship is a great way to gain real-world work experience. Securing an internship with the largest petroleum company in China would be even better. And that is what Penn State students got the chance to do this summer through Penn State’s Energy Business and Finance (EBF) program.
Through internships with Dalian Petrochemical, a subsidiary of PetroChina - China’s biggest oil and gas producer - Penn State students had the opportunity to learn first-hand about the petrochemical industry.
Located in the port city of Dalian in Liaoning Province on China’s beautiful northeast Pacific coast, Dalian Petrochemical is one of PetroChina’s main refineries. As part of the internship, each student was paired with a mentor from Dalian Petrochemical and given a specific project to work on.
Taylor Clayton, a junior in EBF, was assigned the task of evaluating the impact of PetroChina meeting U.S. regulatory requirements, using the company’s internal capital cost estimator.
“This internship gave me the chance to put into practice what I have learned from my studies in the EBF program,” said Clayton. “The PetroChina internship has opened my eyes to the inner workings of a petroleum company. This internship provides a valuable set of experiences for anybody participating in it. I also had a great opportunity to learn from my PetroChina mentor.”
The internships are part of a summer study abroad program offered by the EBF program in the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences’ John and Willie Leone Family Department of Energy and Mineral Engineering. EBF partnered with the Dalian University of Technology (DUT) to produce the six-week study abroad program focusing on how China is dealing with the energy and environmental challenges caused by the growth of the Chinese economy.
This is the third consecutive summer that the EBF study abroad program took students to DUT and this summer’s cohort of six students indicated they had a great time in China.
“Everyone was so nice – from the DUT staff, to the DUT faculty, to the DUT students and all the people we met during our travels,” said Nur Hafid Mohadi, a senior in EBF. “This has been a truly wonderful experience.”
Studies at DUT
Students took two challenging three-credit classes at DUT: Chinese economic history and Chinese environmental policy, taught by DUT resident faculty.
“I usually don’t find history interesting,” said Yubaihe Zhou, who is majoring in statistics. “But since 1949, with the cultural revolution and the market reformation, the course of China’s economy has been fascinating.”
In discussing China’s tradeoff between economic growth and protecting the environment, Xiangzun Leo Wang, a sophomore in chemistry, said that “it looks like China is really trying to deal with its environmental challenges.”