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10.11

IEEE at Forefront of Efforts to Revitalize Power & Energy Engineering Careers

By Chris McManes

There has perhaps never been a better time to be a power engineer in the United States. Salaries are strong, interest in renewable fuels is high and Smart Grid efforts promise to modernize the U.S. electric power system.

“I think that we’re in a perfect storm because we are operating an electrical infrastructure that’s aging and we’ve got to keep it going,” former IEEE Power & Energy Society President Wanda Reder said. “This is a 24/7 operation, it’s interconnected, it’s highly complex, and we’re dependent on that aged infrastructure. And we have to figure out a way to migrate it into the future.”

Designing and building the Smart Grid — basically the application of modern computer, sensor and communication technology to the power grid — is helping to attract more students to study power engineering.

“A lot of different disciplines are converging right now, resulting in technologies that allow us to do things better than we have been in the past,” Reder said. “I think that we are going to figure out how to run more efficiently, we’re going to figure out how to engage the consumer in the process, and we’re going to figure out how to do it cleaner and better. I think it’s going to be especially interesting as we start to see the transportation domain and the power and energy domain start to converge. [There’s] a lot of opportunity there, things that I can’t even begin to envision.

“The students that are getting their education now will be faced with all of this in the future — very exciting times.”

Reder, who served as PES president in 2008-09, works as vice president of the Power Systems Services Division of S&C Electric Company in Chicago. She made her remarks during an interview at the 2011 PES General Meeting in Detroit in late July.

Rejuvenating the Workforce

To encourage more people to study power engineering, PES launched the IEEE PES Scholarship Plus Initiative in late 2010 and just awarded its first scholarships to 93 students at 51 U.S. Universities. The society seeded the effort with $1 million, and its goal is to support 300 to 500 students each year. Offered only in the United States now, the plan is for it eventually to be worldwide. Recipients must be considering a career in electric power and energy engineering, working towards an electrical engineering bachelor’s degree, be a full-time student in the coming academic year and be willing to take at least three power engineering courses.

The initiative is important because, according to the Center for Energy Workforce Development, the U.S. power engineering field could experience as much as 50 percent attrition over the next five years. This depends in part on how many engineers actually retire and how many leave for other reasons, such as job change.

In April 2009, PES’ U.S. Power and Energy Engineering Workforce Collaborative published its recommendations for addressing the potential shortfall. It concluded that an ample supply of skilled power and energy engineers “is critical to success in meeting national policy objectives toward energy independence and security, global competitiveness, environmental stewardship, and quality of life. To get that supply, we have to start making investments today by:

• “Communicating an image of an engineer as someone who solves problems that make a difference in the world

• “Increasing interest among our youth in math, science and engineering

• “Improving the quality of high school and post-high school education

• “Building, enhancing and sustaining university power engineering programs in part through increased research support.”

The report also recommended doubling the production of undergraduate and graduate power engineering students. This is where the Scholarship Plus Initiative comes into play. The program provides scholarship funds for up to three years, as well as an opportunity to gain experience through internships and co-ops within the power and energy industry. Students are encouraged to apply during their freshman year and, if selected, can receive up to $7,000: $2,000 during both their sophomore and junior years, and $3,000 as a senior.

If you are interested in learning more about the Scholarship Plus Initiative, you can contact PES at scholarship-donation@ieee.org.

Reder was encouraged by the nearly 300 students who attended the PES Student/Industry/Faculty Luncheon and Job Fair for Students at the Detroit PES General Meeting.

“The Scholarship Plus effort has clearly increased the visibility of a career in power engineering and it’s generating more interest,” Reder said. “The attendance alone speaks volumes — it’s amazing. It was just a few years ago that we were struggling to get students here, we were struggling to find students; curriculums had gone by the wayside. So I think that this program is really a turning point to increasing industry interest and participation — very exciting times.”

Dr. Peter Sauer, who holds the Grainger Chair in Electrical Engineering at the University of Illinois, is an active PES volunteer and IEEE Fellow. In 1997, PES honored him with its Outstanding Power Engineering Educator Award. While addressing the students during the job fair, he praised Reder.

“She has done more for power engineering education than all past PES presidents combined,” Sauer said. “She is an incredible role model, not just for women engineers; she is an incredible role model for all engineers, and especially IEEE volunteers.”

From Scant Interest to Promising Careers

Reder began studying the waning interest among students in power engineering careers in the 2004-05 time frame.

“It was clear from my vantage point that we needed to reinvest in talent,” she said. “I began looking to other utilities, doing research through [Edison Electric Institute], and ultimately came to the conclusion that we were facing a significant attrition challenge. Until I started doing some comprehensive survey work, I did not have an appreciation for the potential industry risk from knowledge loss due to pending attrition. And I also had even less of an appreciation that our power engineering educational foundation was eroding because many of the curriculums had dropped over time. “

Reder said that when she entered the power workforce in 1987, it was the tail end of a hiring wave for U.S. electric utilities.

“There was virtually no hiring through the ’90s and very little even into the 2000s,” she said. “In fact, many companies were active with mergers during this period, so not only were we not hiring, we were releasing people in the middle and senior parts of their careers. So, as a result, electrical and computer engineering [academic] department heads often decided to fill open power engineering faculty positions with those from other disciplines.

“And I think now it’s very obvious that power and energy is on the forefront of what we need to work on for innovation.”

Sauer sees a bright future for power engineering students.

“There are a lot of engineers and faculty out there that are reaching [retirement] age, and it is going to create a huge deficit in our ranks of working engineers and professors,” he said. “So the next five years is a great time to be graduating, not just with a B.S., but also to continue on with a master’s and Ph.D. [They] almost certainly will not have any problem with employment.”

Salaries Picking Up

One area believed to have held people back from pursuing a career in power engineering was salary. While still not as high as many other electrical and computer engineering areas, pay has picked up.

According to the IEEE-USA Salary & Benefits Survey, 2011 Edition, U.S. energy and power engineering professionals reported a 2010 median income of $107,000 from primary sources (salary, commissions, bonuses and net self-employment income). This reflects a gain of $25,000 from 2000, or 30.5 percent.

This increase was better than the 26.7 percent gain for all U.S. IEEE members during that same time ($93,100 median in 2000 and $118,000 in 2010).

“We’re much more competitive than we were before,” Reder said. “… Power is looked upon as a favorable career option, and the salaries are there as well.”

Reder became PES president the same year (2008) the organization changed its name from IEEE Power Engineering Society to Power & Energy Society.

“As the power industry, we’ve missed the mark on image, [but] we’re learning how to change that,” Reder said. “That’s the reason we changed our name — because we wanted to make that connection to the society at large, that we are the lifeblood.”

Because we all depend on power engineers for a safe, reliable and on-demand delivery of electricity, their work is critical to our economy and way of life.

“You think about what happens in these significant blackouts and these significant natural disasters, and you quickly realize how dependent we are on power,” Reder said. “And it’s only becoming more so. You know, our coffee pots, even our toilet seats; the list goes on of what’s now becoming intertwined with electricity. And when you don’t have it, things come to a complete halt.”

PES-Careers is a free online service designed to connect engineering students and recent graduates with employers offering internships and jobs. Employers can post job openings and candidates can post their resume and profiles to make it easier to be found. Go to www.pes-careers.org.

PES’ leadership is helping to make power engineering look more appealing all the time.

“In terms of Smart Grid, renewables, sustainability and our clean future,” Reder said, “it’s providing a tremendous opportunity for those that are entering the career.”

Chris McManes is IEEE-USA’s public relations manager and an affiliate member of the IEEE Professional Communication Society.

Comments may be submitted to todaysengineer@ieee.org.