Modern society relies on the work of chemical, biochemical and process engineers – they help manage resources, protect the environment, and control health and safety procedures, while developing the processes that make the products we desire or depend on.
Chemical engineering is all about changing raw materials into useful products you use every day in a safe and cost-effective way. For example, petrol, plastics and synthetic fibres such as polyester and nylon, all come from oil.
Chemical engineers understand how to alter the chemical, biochemical or physical state of a substance, to create everything from face creams to fuels.
The department was established in the 1975/76 session as first the Department of Chemical Engineering and Food Technology. It was later split in 1978 into two separate departments, namely:
- Chemical Engineering and
- Food Technology.
The first graduates in Chemical Engineering obtained their Higher National Diploma in 1979 and were eleven in number.
The initial programme of the department was designed to produce in a unique two-tier system in keeping with the Institute’s policy at the time, licentiates in three years and associates in five years post WASC/SSCE.
This programme’s objective was modified by the Federal Military Government directive first to a four-year Higher National Diploma, then to a straight three-year National Diploma and finally to a two-tier ND/HND programme which has been operational till date.
The department started with no equipment, but with a culture of hard work and creativity, which clearly started from the inception of the department, was able to buy more and higher quality equipment for fractions of what it cost others. The equipment in the laboratories compare favourably with what is obtainable in older universities offering Chemical Engineering. Even in the face of unfavourable economic climate, the department has been able to utilize the goodwill of the management of IMT, the British council and the National Board of Technical Education to update and maintain the equipment.