Student Experiences
I am Manish Shrivastava from Nalanda, India. I am doing a two year MSc programme in Offshore and Dredging Engineering at TU Delft. Before joining TU Delft, I was a professional Marine Engineer. I sailed in Container Ships and then in Offshore Ships in Bombay High Oil field, where I saw the potential scope of offshore technology in future. Due to ever increasing prices of real estate in coastal cities, rising sea levels, world dredging technology is undergoing natural boost. Shore based Oil and Gas industry has touched its saturation point. Offshore oil and gas companies are going deeper and deeper to search oil and they need best technology and brain in this nascent field. I found the Offshore and Dredging Engineering course at TU Delft to be very versatile and comprehensive. Four specializations and many subspecialisations give students option to choose and streamline their specific interests in Bottom founded structures, Floating Structures, Dredging, Subsea, Arctic, Pipeline, Deep Sea Mining, Wind Turbine and many other technology areas. Course has support of Dutch Offshore and Dredging industry, best teachers and mentors. Delft has one of most beautiful natural surroundings. Multicultural atmosphere at university helps in understanding different cultural backgrounds and it brings together their delicacies, which I find very useful for efficient working multicultural offshore industry. I am working on my thesis on topic ‘Analysis of Vertical Hydrodynamic Force During Float over from Dockwise Vanguard’. I am learning about future scope of CFD simulations to get insight into physics of non-linear phenomena in offshore hydrodynamics. I am enjoying my work. I also work 10 hours a week at pipelay company Allseas, as Junior Technical Inspector. I can certainly say, Dutch industry is most advanced among offshore competitors, and vicinity of TU Delft helps students and industry both in maintaining the innovative edge. I think, I made best decision of my life to study MSc in Offshore and Dredging at TU Delft.
My name is Nick Sanders and I’m from Zaandam, The Netherlands. Although my name sounds very Dutch I am actually half Spanish, half Dutch. Currently I am following the MSc programme in Offshore and Dredging Engineering at the TU Delft. Before I started this master, I studied the Civil Engineering bachelor at the TU Delft. I have always been interested in the renewable section and large scale projects, so for me Offshore Engineering offered a combination of two things I really enjoy. Working on billion dollar projects related to oil & gas and then trying to stimulate the offshore wind industry with innovative projects and solutions to new challenges. The offshore & dredging industry is still very large. There has been a dip recently due to the drop in oil prices, but offshore engineering is still a very versatile and important industry that works in many sectors apart from oil and gas. For my specialization I chose Bottom Founded Structures. Within this specialization there are many interesting elective courses related to wind farms and wind energy. Also, this will allow me to find a thesis project related to wind energy.
The TU Delft is the only university that offers Offshore Engineering as a specific MSc programme. Therefore, there are a lot of opportunities. Since the start of the Master we have been introduced more and more to the different ways of harvesting energy from the ocean. The ocean energy concepts are still very much in the research phase, but have a huge potential to become the main energy resource in the near future. This fuels my interest and could be a very interesting area for research in the future or possibly even for my upcoming thesis. The enthusiasm from the Dutch offshore industry is also very encouraging. There are many open days with the companies, info market days, sponsored networking events that include drinks and often dinners. The companies are really going out of their way to encourage students and motivate them within offshore.
I am very happy with my choice for the Offshore & Dredging Engineering MSc programme. The opportunities are huge, the master is challenging, the industry is still very much booming and the people within offshore are great company.
