There is a missing generation in the UK oil and gas industry. The older workers who trained in the 1970s are thinking about retirement; the youngsters drawn by huge salaries because of rising energy prices are still too young to step into the retirees’ shoes. An industry that ticked over happily in the Nineties is suddenly feeling the need for senior, skilled workers because the world’s largest oil and gas fields are running low.

“We had ten years of not much activity in the North Sea in the Nineties,” says David Doig, chief executive of the Opito Oil and Gas Academy. “The infrastructure was kept going but the workforce wasn’t invested in for growth. We’re now playing catchup.”

And it’s not just the UK. Brazil is facing a huge recruitment problem, says Brian Nolk, vice-president in the energy sector at DMG World Media, which puts on oil and gas recruitment events such as the Global Petroleum Show in Calgary, Canada. There has recently been a massive find off Brazil (the Tupi oil field), equal in size to all the reserves in Norway. “During exploration and production you have to create whole cities,” he says. This means analysts, instrumentation people and all the support functions around any big habitation.

He adds: “What has made the global recruitment problem more acute is that the known fields, such as those in the Gulf, are depleting rapidly, which has forced people to go into more inhospitable terrain. The very large fields we have relied on for 20 years are now depleting, so we’re having to go to places like Tupi, where the oil is 600m (2,000ft) below the surface of the ocean.” He cites the oil sands of Canada as another example of oil reserves that would have been discounted 20 years ago as too expensive to mine, but which are now being exploited.

Some countries are solving the recruitment crisis by developing their own people. The Trinidadian petroleum industry is 100 years old, but gas has been part of its energy sector for only 25 years. Atlantic LNG, the liquified natural gas operating company, has trained up almost all its operators, says Pat Ganase, the manager for government and public affairs at the company in Trinidad and Tobago. “Ninety-five per cent of our staff are local,” she says. “A large part of our operational staff – those who are hands-on with the equipment – have come through programmes at the University of Trinidad and Tobago.” Atlantic LNG was involved in the founding of the university and advises on engineering and technology programmes, with a view to offering work to those who complete courses.

Ganase says that they do have some expats working for them, especially those with specialist skills, and that the industry still offers incredible opportunities for travel. Recent graduates with engineering and geoscience qualifications – and a sense of adventure – stand to make a lot of money.

Nolk says that the only way that companies will get workers to go out to some of the world’s most dangerous and inhospitable terrain is by paying them more. In addition, the chances for progression for the ambitious and talented are greater than in other professions because of the gap left by the “missing generation”.

If the future of the planet, and not money, interests you, this is still an industry to consider seriously. The skills used now for oil and gas exploration and production are going to be transferrable when reserves run out. “In the next 10 to 20 years we will be producing devices that will harness power from under the water,” says David Pridden, the chief executive of Subsea UK, which represents subsea companies.

Doig sums up this sentiment more succinctly: “Join the oil industry and save the planet.”

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