PTT Global Chemical Public Co., Ltd.

 

 

PTT Global Chemical Public Co., Ltd. (PTTGC) was founded on 19th October 2011 through the amalgamation of PTT Chemical Public Co., Ltd. and PTT Aromatics and Refining Public Co., Ltd. to be the chemical flagship of PTT Group. The integration results in reaching a total Olefins and Aromatics production capacity of 8.2 million tons per year and petroleum production capacity of 280,000 barrels per day, making it Thailand’s largest and Asia’s leading integrated petrochemical and refining company.

 

In addition to being a practice site for ChEPS, ThaiOil now provides industrial scholarships to qualified ChEPS students.

 

COLLABORATIONS WITH PTTGC

 

There have been many levels of collaboration between ChEPS and PTTGC since 2008.  These collaborations include:

 

• Serving as a practice station for second-year ChEPS interned students

• Providing PBL projects for first-year ChEPS students

• Employment recruitment of graduating ChEPS students

• Full scholarships for qualified ChEPS students in exchange for

              contract-bound employment upon graduation

 

Each level of collaboration is further elaborated below.

 

Site Projects

 

Practical training is compulsory during the second year when students are enrolled in ChEPS. PTTGC has served as a practice station for ChEPS since 2008 and sponsored 21 site projects in which interned students receive practical training at its petrochemical facilities in the Maptaphut Industrial Estate in Rayong.  PTTGC allows ChEPS faculty and students to access their production facilities, which play a pivotal role in providing practical training for students in the second year of their study.  At the same time, the company has gained valuable human resources who can work on longer-term projects, thus freeing up company engineers to focus on more urgent needs.

 

The duration of the practice phase is five months.  Students work in teams of two or three on two projects in series, and take turns being the project leader.  So each project is 10 weeks long, during which there is a proposal presentation, a progress presentation, and a final presentation.  ChEPS faculty on campus also travels to the site and attend these presentations to provide further input.  Due to time constraints, most site projects tend to be simulation-oriented, which seek to debottleneck, troubleshoot, and optimize (e.g. minimizing energy consumption) existing plants.  A total of 21 projects sponsored by the company and its affiliates were carried out by ChEPS students.

 

Projects for Problem-Based Learning (PBL)

 

An important aspect of the ChEPS curriculum which helps students prepare for their subsequent internships is the incorporation of problem-based learning (PBL) into some core courses during the first year.  PBL is vital in helping students hone their problem-solving and presentation skills. In most cases, these case studies, which tend to be too narrow in scope to be site projects, are solicited from sponsoring companies. The PBL projects introduced into the classroom mimics certain aspects of the site projects.  Over the years, PTTGC has sponsored 9 PBL projects.