‘Slap in the face’: Pandemic disrupts nascent oil careers
HOUSTON — Sabrina Burns, a senior at the University of Texas at Austin, had thought she would belaunching a lucrative career inthe oil andgas industry when she graduated in a fewmonths.
But the collapse in the demand for oil and gas during the coronavirus pandemichas disrupted her well-laid plans.
“We got a slap inthe face, an entirely unforeseen situation that rocked our entire mindset,” said Burns, who is studying petroleum engineering. “I have applied for every oil and gas position I’ve seen ... and nothing really has turnedup. I’m discouraged.”
With fewer people commuting and traveling, the oil and gas industry has taken a punishing blow. Oil companies have laid off more than 100,000 workers. Many businesses have closed refineries, and some have sought bankruptcy protection.
The industry has attracted thousands of young people in recent years with the promise of secure careers as shale drilling took off and made the United States the world’s largest producer of oil. But many students and recent graduates say they are no longer sure that there is a place forthemin the industry. Evenafter thepandemic ends, someof themfear that growing concerns about climate change will lead to the inevitable decline of oil and gas.
These students are seeking elite positions in an oil and gas industry that employs about 2 million people. Even after recent layoffs, petroleum companies still employ more people than the fast-growing wind and solar businesses, which have a combined workforce of at least 370,000, according to trade groups.
Burns, 22, said her choices have narrowed considerably over the past nine months. With opportunities in oil and gas limited, she recently accepted an internship with an engineering consulting firm specializing in energy conservation, and she may eventually apply to graduate school inenvironmental science.
Tosa Nehikhuere, the son of Nigerian immigrants, has been relatively lucky. Shortly afterhe graduated from the University of Texas at Austin in 2018, he joined a big European oil company, working various internships and jobs in the field and on the trading floor.
But it has been such an unsteady ride that he already has misgivings about the direction he took in college.
In the middle of Ne hik huere’s freshman year, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, ledby Saudi Arabia, flooded theworldmarket with oil to try to undercut the booming U.S. shale oil drilling industry, sending prices tumbling.
“It was pretty nerve- wracking,” he recalled. “I sawseniorswith three internships at the same company get frozen out; juniors, sophomores having trouble getting internships.”
Nehikhuere thought about switching majors, but he figured that oil prices would recover, as they had somany times, andthey did through most of 2018 and 2019.
But the coronavirus pandemic took hold just as Nehikhuere’s career was gaining traction, and now he isworried again.
Nehikhuere, 24, did not want to identify his employer, but he said it is laying off workers and is debating how aggressively itshould pivot awayfromoil and gas toward renewable energy.
If the company does move rapidly toward cleaner energy, he said, he is not sure if there will be a place in it for him. “How much aremy skills going to transfer?”