Just make sure he's aware of what exactly is chem engineering. It's not discovering new chemicals. That would be chemistry PhDs. It's not even discovering new reaction pathways, that's still mostly chemistry people (process chemists).
Chem engineering is process engineering. Chemists give you the reaction they want to do, and how much of it. Then engineers will size boilers, heat exchangers, pipes, process controllers and a bunch of other industrial equipment to make this happen.
It's not a bad career, you just have to be aware that it mostly happens in a production/manufacturing kind of environment with everything that entails (ie possible oncall in case of plant emergencies on weekends, etc).
As a professional engineer, you are putting your ass and your career on the line every time you sign off on a design. If an accident happens with loss of human life, serious injuries or large financial loss, you can be sued and you can have your license revoked if it was caused by a mistake in your design. You have to be able to live with this weight on your shoulders every day you come in to work.
It's obviously not paid as much as programming, but what is? Programming is pretty much an outlier at the moment, chem eng is probably in line with other traditional engineering disciplines (civil, electrical, mechanical, etc).
Chem engineering is process engineering. Chemists give you the reaction they want to do, and how much of it. Then engineers will size boilers, heat exchangers, pipes, process controllers and a bunch of other industrial equipment to make this happen.
It's not a bad career, you just have to be aware that it mostly happens in a production/manufacturing kind of environment with everything that entails (ie possible oncall in case of plant emergencies on weekends, etc).
As a professional engineer, you are putting your ass and your career on the line every time you sign off on a design. If an accident happens with loss of human life, serious injuries or large financial loss, you can be sued and you can have your license revoked if it was caused by a mistake in your design. You have to be able to live with this weight on your shoulders every day you come in to work.
It's obviously not paid as much as programming, but what is? Programming is pretty much an outlier at the moment, chem eng is probably in line with other traditional engineering disciplines (civil, electrical, mechanical, etc).