5 minute read
Training and development for the future of energy
By Tsvetana Paraskova
Digitalisation in the oil and gas industry and the net-zero emission pledges from many governments call for new sets of skills in the energy sector. The industry looks to attract and train talent with digitalisation skills and skills needed for the net-zero commitments.
Skills Needed for Net-Zero
The UK North Sea Transition Deal, for example, is expected to support up to 40,000 high-quality direct and indirect supply chain jobs in the UK’s industrial heartlands. One of the key commitments in the deal, People & Skills, contains actions and measures to facilitate the reskilling of existing parts of the oil and gas workforce. According to the UK government and sector associations, many of the skills present in the sector are also transferrable across the wider energy sector. Offshore renewables, carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS),
and hydrogen industries will rely heavily on many of the current skillsets in the oil and gas industry such as geologists, project managers, and a wide variety of engineers and fabricators.
“A carefully managed transition will help to ensure a prosperous future for the communities affected and that the UK economy retains people with these key skillsets, as demand for their current roles in the oil and gas sector wanes with production decline, so that they can help unlock these vital emerging low carbon sectors,” the Deal says.
Under the deal, the sector will map future energy skills demand, develop all-energy training and standards, and create an integrated people and skills plan, with measurable objectives, to support its transition and diversification.
The UK government, for its part, will continue to champion the role of the sector and its workforce in the energy transition, supporting work on its People and Skills Plan. The government will continue to prioritise support for people in high carbon sectors of the economy, which need to transition, via the Green Jobs Taskforce.
Mass Skilled Workforce Needed for UK Net-Zero Strategy
According to a survey of more than 400 professionals from the UK energy system, from renewables to oil and gas, the UK will need mass skilled workforce to achieve its net-zero strategy. The seventh annual Energy Barometer report from the Energy Institute (EI) showed in July that it will be skilled people that will make net-zero happen.
‘The Energy Barometer 2021: the net-zero skills issue’ found that most UK energy professionals are already training for net-zero and considering a move this decade. Professionals agree that the push of a skills strategy, from schools and up, is needed, alongside the pull of a stable energy policy.
Moreover, UK energy professionals also believe that upskilling and retraining are essential to avoid leaving conventional workforces and their communities stranded in the energy transition. As a whole, a majority of UK energy professionals call for more action by government and industry to build the skilled workforce of the future.
“A laser focus on policies and initiatives to drive the development of low-carbon technologies is vital, but it must not eclipse the equally important need to support and develop the net-zero workforce,” Energy Institute President Steve Holliday FREng FEI said.
“The Barometer is clear that decarbonisation won’t happen at the necessary speed and scale without the assembly of a mass skilled workforce, and so we are encouraged by signals from ministers that this will be an integral part of the UK’s net-zero strategy,” he added.
UK Energy Research Centre (UKERC) Director and EI Trustee, Prof Rob Gross FEI, commented on the survey:
Digitalisation Skills
Apart from finding, educating, or upskilling the people that could help deliver the energy transition, the industry in the UK and worldwide needs to also address the digital skills gap, especially in the oil and gas sector.
The growing digitalisation drive in energy leaves a skills gap that needs to be addressed. Digital skills are essential for the oil and gas industry as it reshapes for the future.
The COVID pandemic and the crisis in the energy sector made the need of investment in digitalisation all the more urgent, according to an EY survey from September 2020. However, technology does not use itself, it needs skilled people to work with it, the Oil and Gas Digital Transformation and the Workforce Survey 2020 from EY showed.
A total of 46% of oil and gas companies, on average, said they did not have the skills within their current workforce to realise the investment on their adopted technologies. Moreover, firms shared in the survey that there is a gap between digital technologies they believe are important and the maturity of skills needed to implement those technologies. For example, company executives see Big Data analytics and insights as one of the top three trends that could drive business growth over the next three years. However, the gap between strategic importance and maturity of key skills was one of the widest on data analytics at 59%, EY’s survey showed.
“It’s not enough for companies to simply spend more on technology. Investment in the workforce is needed to scale and integrate technologies and ultimately capture the intended value. Companies must find an investment balance while addressing market pressures. Otherwise, the industry could potentially lose crucial years and a generation of workers,” said Tim Haskell, US Oil & Gas People Advisory Services Leader, Ernst & Young LLP (EY US).
The overwhelming majority of oil and gas executives, 92%, think that their ability to reskill as a company will determine their success over the next three years, according to the EY survey. But only 9% feel strongly that they have a robust plan in place to do so, and just 3% feel strongly their organisation is good at teaching in-demand skills.
“Oil and gas will encounter stiff competition for talent and will have to overcome negative perceptions among younger generations who tend to favor careers in technology and other industries. This makes reskilling and upskilling even more of an urgent priority for oil and gas companies,” Haskell says.
The new trends in the energy sector, with growing digitalisation and commitments to net-zero, need investment not only in new technologies and diversification, but also a targeted investment in retaining, upskilling, and attracting talent with skills the industry needs to be successful in the energy transition.
