U.S. shale magnate Harold Hamm is leading efforts to lure an increasingly skeptical younger generation into the oil and gas industry as concerns about climate change and job insecurity undermine the industry's appeal to graduates and skilled workers. are doing.
“We will be using oil for the next 50 years and “clean burning” natural gas for probably the next 100 or 150 years. . . We want to involve the next generation of game changers,” said the businessman, who recently donated $50 million to create the Hamm American Energy Institute at Oklahoma State University.
The 78-year-old pioneered the 20-year shale revolution that turned the United States into the world's largest oil and gas producer.
But after the world agreed to “move away from fossil fuels” at the United Nations climate change conference, COP28, in December, he and other industry leaders warned that applications for petroleum engineering and related courses in and around the United States had declined. We focused our efforts on responding to the Europe.
The Hamm Institute is one of a growing number of initiatives aimed at dispelling negative perceptions of the industry. In 2022, ExxonMobil donated $16.4 million to universities around the world, and Chevron helped establish a job readiness program in the U.S. called SkillsReady to prepare and attract workers to the oil and gas sector.
Oil majors Shell and BP are offering scholarships and apprenticeship programs to attract more young people into the sector. Shell has also led efforts to promote its legacy products on platforms popular with young people, such as TikTok and Twitch.
But they face formidable challenges. According to a study by Lloyd Heinze, a professor emeritus at Texas Tech University, undergraduate enrollment in a study that primarily focused on petroleum engineering courses in the United States fell from 7,046 in 2019 to 3,911 last year. Some universities in the United States and Europe are removing oil and gas-focused courses from their curricula, and others are restructuring courses to include green energy.
Growing public concern about climate change has led to a backlash against the oil and gas industry, particularly on some campuses in Europe. In November, Swansea became the seventh university in the UK to ban fossil fuel companies from advertising to students at career fairs.
The global membership of the Society of Petroleum Engineers, an industry association, fell from 168,125 in 2015 to 119,120 in 2022, but the average age of its professional members rose to 48 from 45 in the same period. .
“[Students have] “We've been told for a very long time that we're going to run out of oil and gas, and I'm worried about having a long-term career,” said Jennifer Miskimins, chair of petroleum engineering at the Colorado School of Mines.
He said the skills shortage was already having an impact, with some companies reporting to schools that they were not meeting their “recruitment targets”.
Record U.S. production and a boom in mergers and acquisitions have raised concerns about talent shortages, and companies expect strong demand for fossil fuels for decades. Some experts predict that companies will need to overhaul their hiring models if they are to continue pumping oil and pursue new opportunities such as carbon capture and storage.
Heinze, who researches petroleum engineering enrollment in U.S. schools, said oil price spikes like the one in 2022, when oil prices peaked above $130 per barrel, typically affect U.S.-based It is said that this will lead to a sharp increase in enrollment in petroleum engineering courses. But last year there was a “decoupling” between oil prices and registrations, he said.
“Until the past five years, registrations lagged very much behind oil prices. [with] Climate change, what's happening with fossil fuels, those impacts are getting bigger and bigger. ”
There is also a shortage of skilled workers, such as welders, rig workers and heavy equipment operators, who are essential to maintaining oil and gas supplies.
Mike Rowe, who runs the Vocational Education Foundation, said society has persistently downgraded education beyond graduate level for decades.
“There's a generation of kids who don't believe you can make six numbers with your hands. . . . But this is not true. My foundation has probably trained 700 welders and , most of which make six-digit numbers.”
Skills shortages are a global problem. In the UK, where Chancellor Rishi Sunak recently announced an annual licensing round to exploit the North Sea's dwindling oil reserves, there are concerns about talent shortages in trades such as welders, as well as drilling and geosciences. has been done.
“It's not that we're running out of oil, it's that we're running out of people to run the facilities that produce oil,” said Ken, managing director of Hibiscus Petroleum, a Malaysian oil and gas producer that recently obtained a license in the north.・Mr. Pereira says. Ocean.
He said an aging workforce and too few new entrants would hit the industry within about a decade, citing a lack of job security and growing environmental concerns.
Katy Heidenreich, director of supply chain and talent at British trade group Offshore Energies UK, said fewer people to hire would also help develop technologies such as carbon capture and storage, which require employees with similar skills. He says he will be late.
“The number of universities offering these courses is decreasing and that is an area of real concern.”
This includes Imperial College London, which has taught petroleum-related courses since the 1910s.
Professor Martin Brandt, professor in Imperial University's School of Geosciences and Engineering, who led the university's transition from petroleum engineering to a new master's program combining geoenergy, machine learning and data science, says the situation is driven by a youth-led environmental backlash. It was more complicated than that. Even fossil fuels.
There was a “collapse in applications” after the coronavirus outbreak, but there was also a “permanent trend of very few jobs,” he said.
Heidenreich believes more “long-term planning” is needed in an industry that hires and fires during booms and busts.
Brandt added: “The oil industry needs to stop moaning about this and show that it's offering the kind of benefits and financial rewards you see in the tech industry.”
The Society of Petroleum Engineers expects membership to rise as university student intakes hit rock bottom, but says more needs to be done to attract young people to the highly competitive market. .
“Is our industry as sexy as computer science, high tech, and aerospace? We do a lot of great things, but it's hard to put it into the public domain. [important]” said Terrence Parrish, president of the association.
Hamm, who organized the inaugural meeting at the Hamm Institute's new campus in September, said he believes the conversation around fossil fuels has changed over the past year and will attract more students to the field. Ta. Invasion of Ukraine.
“It was hopeless when everyone was touting things like eliminating fossil fuels, but that was short-lived.”
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