Process Engineer

Process Engineer — Apex Chemical Systems

Houston, TX | January 2024 – Present

• Led the optimization of a continuous chemical synthesis line, utilizing Aspen Plus to model heat and mass balances, which increased daily production throughput by 16% without increasing raw material costs.
• Managed a $450,000 facility upgrade project, coordinating with 3 equipment vendors to replace aging distillation columns, which reduced annual utility expenses by 14% and minimized downtime.
• Authored 15 new standard operating procedures (SOPs) for startup and shutdown sequences, reducing average plant restart times by 22% while maintaining strict OSHA compliance.
• Facilitated weekly hazard and operability (HAZOP) studies for new reactors, resolving 28 potential design blockers and improving team safety audit scores from 82% to 98% over a 12-month period.

Associate Process Engineer — Vertex Petrochemicals

Beaumont, TX | August 2020 – December 2023

• Analyzed manufacturing waste streams using MATLAB, designing a new filtration recovery loop that reclaimed 18% of catalyst materials and saved $65,000 in procurement costs annually.
• Updated 40+ piping and instrumentation diagrams (P&IDs) in AutoCAD for a refinery unit expansion, supporting 12 engineers and reducing drawing revision cycles by 24% over 8 months.
• Conducted root cause analysis (RCA) on 14 valve failure incidents, implementing new preventative maintenance schedules that improved overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) by 9%.
• Calibrated and tested 50+ pressure and temperature sensors during a major plant turnaround, finishing all validation tasks 3 days ahead of schedule and ensuring 100% calibration accuracy.

Process design, Heat and mass transfer, Piping & Instrumentation Diagrams (P&IDs), Process safety management (PSM), Hazard and operability (HAZOP) studies, Root cause analysis (RCA), Six Sigma, Aspen Plus, AutoCAD, MATLAB, Minitab, Microsoft Excel, OSHA compliance, Lean manufacturing

Distillation Column Optimization

Role: Lead Process Engineer

Tools: Aspen Plus, AutoCAD, Microsoft Excel

Modeled and optimized feed preheat temperatures, reducing steam consumption by 15% and saving $40,000 in annual fuel costs.

Catalyst Recovery Integration

Role: Process Engineer

Tools: MATLAB, AutoCAD, Minitab

Designed a secondary filtration unit that reclaimed 18% of precious metal catalyst from process effluent, reducing manufacturing waste by 22%.

• Engineer in Training (EIT) (2020)
• Six Sigma Green Belt (2022)
• OSHA 10-Hour General Industry Certification (2021)

• Languages: English (Native), German (Conversational)
• Volunteer Work: Technical mentor for local high school robotics team (2022-present)
• Availability: 2 weeks notice