There was an outcry when the Free University in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, recently announced its intention to close its geoscience department. Many well-respected geoscientists posted on LinkedIn how bad this was for the energy transition, as that is where so many earth science graduates are so greatly needed. Without saying a word about all those alumni who landed excellent roles in oil over the past few decades. But that is a by-the-by.
The cold reality however, is; it is becoming increasingly obvious that the energy transition does not yet deliver the geoscience jobs we all want. Geothermal does not grow rapidly enough, and CCS is more like a refuge for ex-oil people than it is a new avenue for those wanting to join that industry straight from university.
How does it work for oil and gas then? At the end of the day, there are still students who do see a future in hydrocarbons, if not just for paying the mortgage and having a decent and technically challenging position.
But those brave enough to want to venture into oil, there is another surprise. It looks as if even in oil, job opportunities for geoscientists are less frequently posted.
That is not a surprise in the North Sea, where production has declined dramatically over the past few years in the UK, Denmark and the Netherlands. And whilst that is not the case in Norway, where production is at a plateau, the exploration community, which traditionally hosted many geoscientists, has also decreased in size significantly because of a focus on near-field exploration. Company mergers are an important factor too.
But a recent trip to Canada, attending the annual Geoconvention, showed that even in a country that is the fourth-largest oil producer in the world, the demand for geoscientists seems much less than it was. That was a bit of a surprise to me, but reflecting on the conversations I had, it all makes more sense.
First of all, exploration – at least onshore Canada – does not really exist anymore. It is all about drilling horizontal wells as quickly as possible, in plays that were mapped a long time ago. You don’t need a geoscientist to come up with a new play model. The basin is past that stage, as it has been so heavily drilled already. When someone made the case in a presentation to explore a certain play, someone from the audience, whilst acknowledging the opportunity, said: “You’re too late, there is no exploration anymore.”
Then there is technology. The rapid advance of horizontal well technology requires fewer wellsite geologists than before, when every well was drilled vertically. It should be remembered that this unfolded only in the last twenty to fifteen years. I spoke to someone from the wellsite geology business, and he said: “We have fewer wellsite geologists in our database. In addition, drilling has become much more engineering-driven, there is less geoscience that goes into it these days.”
Reflecting on this, if even the fourth-largest oil producer of the world needs fewer geoscientists than before, maybe there should be some recognition that the demand side of the profession is not as high as it once used to be. Combined with an energy transition that does not deliver either, it is probably a sign to become more modest about all these opportunities. That’s not a positive message, but it is one that I feel is closer to reality than claiming the opposite.
Is it therefore ok to close geoscience departments? That is too quickly concluded, as we must not forget that many geoscientists end up in jobs unrelated to energy directly, but using the energy transition argument alone is not cutting the mustard anymore. Even not using “energy, i.e. oil, as the driver.
