The UK could lose more than half of its offshore oil and gas jobs by the early 2030s unless urgent and coordinated action is taken immediately, a new report claims.
A new report from Robert Gordon University, named Striking the Balance, outlines three offshore energy workforce scenarios (low, mid, and high cases) and a need for up to £350bn ($473.4bn) of future investment in the UK’s offshore energy sector between 2025 and 2035.
The report suggests a 2030 UK offshore energy workforce requirement for oil, gas, and renewables of between 125,000 and 163,000 jobs, compared to today’s figure of approximately 154,000.
However, the specific UK oil and gas workforce is forecast to fall from 115,000 in 2024 to between 57,000 and 71,000 by the early 2030s. That’s equal to losing approximately 400 jobs every two weeks for the next five years.
On the other hand, the UK offshore renewables workforce is forecast to increase from approximately 39,000 in 2024 to between 84,000 and 153,000 by 2035.
But, there is likely to be limited capacity for the UK offshore renewables sector to host and accommodate the quantity of oil and gas workers becoming available on the job market due to the decline in the oil and gas industry before 2027.
Under a high-case scenario, workforce demand levels across the UK could hit over 210,000, but this will require the delivery of an additional 35GW of offshore wind or 6GW per year, and sustaining UK oil and gas activities for an extended period, like policies applied in Norway, Denmark, and the Netherlands.
This also must include up to 40% UK content in capital expenditure work, and around 600,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day by 2030. The current level of UK content in renewables is typically around 25% for capital activities and up to 85% for operating activities.
“With nearly 1 in 30 of Scotland’s working population currently employed in or supporting the offshore energy industry, compared to a UK-wide figure of approximately 1 in 220, the potential risks for Scotland’s supply chain and workforce are substantial,” the report said.
If Scotland fails to capture the full range of offshore energy opportunities and the oil and gas decline continues to accelerate, the Scottish-based offshore energy workforce could decrease from approximately 75,000 in 2024 to between 45,000 and 63,000 by the early 2030s.
“The UK’s lack of joined-up action means that the window of opportunity for delivering a just transition is closing. Inaction or simply slow progress will mean that UK offshore energy job numbers overall could drop by almost 20% to 125,000 by 2030, making the path towards net zero even harder to negotiate,” said Professor Paul de Leeuw, director of the Energy Transition Institute at Robert Gordon University.
