Question: In your opinion what do you think is the hardest type of engineering?

Marcus Johns answered on 17 Jun 2014:

Hmmmm, as a degree subject I’m slightly biased in this in that I think my undergraduate subject, chemical engineering, is the hardest. There’s a lot of maths involved as well as chemistry and biology and I even had to study law and management.

This is reflected in the workplace as well as chemical engineers usually lead projects in which other engineer types are involved and have to know something about the other engineering disciplines in order to be able to communicate effectively with them. For example, I had to learn about process control (electrical engineering), reactor and tank design (mechanical engineering), and how to design a plant efficiently and within health and safety limits (civil engineering).

However, I’m sure other engineers will tell you that theirs is hardest and, in truth, I think they all have their own challenges that aren’t present in other engineering types.