Professor of Practice
Energy, Sustainability, Process Design, and Process Control
Email: sroat@clemson.edu
Phone: 864-656-0997
Office: 207B Earle Hall
Ph.D., University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Chemical Engineering
M.S., University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Chemical Engineering
B.S., Clemson University, Chemical Engineering
Energy, Sustainability, Process Design, and Process Control
Dr. Roat enjoyed an exciting and rewarding 28-year career working in the oil and gas sector, primarily for Chevron Corporation. During her career, Sue worked in 5 different locations in the United States (Richmond, CA; Pascagoula, M.S.; El Segundo, CA; Billings, MT; Houston, TX) and spent 12 years working overseas in Greece, Kuwait, and Singapore.
She leveraged her undergraduate Chemical Engineering degree from Clemson (1985) and Master of Science (1987) and Ph.D. (1991) work focused on nonlinear optimal control (both in Chemical Engineering at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville) into a full career in supply chain optimization. Starting from individual process optimization early in her career, elaborating on financially optimizing downstream oil refining systems (converting crude oil into gasoline, jet, diesel, etc.) and oil and gas upstream production globally to maximize profitability while maintaining safe and environmentally friendly operations.
Her favorite role was that of Commercial Advisor, responsible for translating the technical aspects of oil and gas production and refining into financial terms for use in process design, project evaluation and execution, and setting overall corporate strategies.
Since retiring from Chevron in August 2018, Dr. Roat is enjoying more time scuba diving, including becoming a PADI-certified scuba diving instructor. She has been as deep as 114 meters and dives with a closed-loop rebreather system. Dr. Roat now enjoys her new role in Clemson’s Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Department: Professor of Practice, teaching Process Design, and Unit Operations Laboratory classes.
Dr. Roat is currently teaching faculty working with primarily junior and senior undergraduate students. She does not have a research group.