Maintenance Engineer

Job Overview

Job Category

Engineers

Sectors

Education

Environment

Indoors primarily with occasional outdoors

About This Career

Maintenance Engineers are part scientist, part mathematician and part detective. They use their specific set of skills to make sure that all of the equipment and machinery used in the oil and gas industry is working properly at all times. Their role covers everything from making sure the correct equipment and parts are purchased to overseeing the installation, operation, and maintenance of the machinery.

The successful operation of oil and gas production requires the reliable working of large numbers of equipment, machinery, systems and infrastructure. Maintenance/Reliability Engineers play a key role in supporting safe operations and ensuring the integrity of assets by ensuring that machinery and equipment run smoothly and reliably. They are responsible for overseeing the evaluation, installation, operation and maintenance of machinery, equipment, mechanical systems and infrastructures. A primary objective is to always seek operational efficiency while safely meeting production requirements.

Maintenance/Reliability Engineers typically work within larger teams. They may lead and oversee work done by the maintenance/asset integrity departments or specialize in areas such as maintenance turn arounds, pipelines or processing facilities.

In this occupation activities may include:

Overview planning of scheduled maintenance programs.
Performing equipment reliability analysis to identify main drivers of equipment downtime and leading the process to determine cost effective solutions.
Researching, designing, evaluating, installing, operating or maintaining mechanical products, equipment, systems or processes.
Supervising technicians, technologists and other engineers by reviewing and approving designs, calculations and cost estimates.
Developing maintenance standards, schedules and programs and providing guidance to industrial maintenance crews.

Education

A bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering or in a related engineering discipline is typically required.
A master's degree or doctorate in a related engineering discipline may be required.

Licensing

Licensing by a provincial or territorial association of professional engineers is required to approve engineering drawings and reports and to practise as a Professional Engineer (P.Eng.).
Engineers are eligible for registration following graduation from an accredited educational program, and after three or four years of supervised work experience in engineering and passing a professional practice examination.

Additional Requirements

Depending on the company and responsibilities, typical requirements may include:
Familiarity with API, ASME, NACE, CSA and other relevant codes and standards, as well as jurisdictional and legal requirements for pressure equipment
Experience with incident investigation and root cause failure analysis (RCA/RCFA)
Specific health and safety certifications may be required, determined by location of work and company requirements

Maintenance Engineers know why problems arise in their facilities and know how to properly solve them. When equipment isn’t working properly, they step in to investigate the cause, to diagnose faulty operations and recommend solutions. They also develop alternate designs or processing methods to find if there are better ways to operate existing machinery. They are key to keeping everything running smoothly.