New research published today reveals that the oil and gas workforce within the engineering construction industry (ECI) could decrease by 7% in the next five years.
The ECI plays a crucial role in the UK meeting its net zero ambitions, spanning sectors that focus on the construction, maintenance and decommissioning of heavy industry, including nuclear, power generation, renewables, chemicals, carbon capture and storage, hydrogen, water treatment as well as oil and gas.
The Engineering Construction Industry Training Board’s (ECITB) Labour Forecasting Tool (LFT) provides insights into workforce numbers across regions and sectors, predicting trends and potential future demand for workers in the industry.
The tool, which was first launched in November 2023, has been updated using findings from the ECITB 2024 Workforce Census and publicly stated timescales on 3,000 active and future ECI projects across Great Britain.
The ECITB’s latest forecast indicates that the size of the oil and gas workforce could total 32,000 by 2030, down from 34,430 this year.
The revised predictions were possible thanks to a record response rate from industry employers for the latest iteration of the ECITB Workforce Census.
The ECITB Workforce Census 2024 offered a comprehensive overview of the ECI workforce in the oil and gas sector, having gathered data on more than 33,000 workers, covering distribution across regions, demographic trends, hiring challenges and business opportunities.
It highlighted that although the oil and gas sector had decreased as a proportion of the ECI (from 36.7% of the industry’s workforce in 2021 to 35.2% in 2024), this did not reflect an actual reduction of workers. Comparisons with the 2021 Census showed the workforce had still grown in those three years from 30,700 to 33,350.
However, this latest projection suggests that number will decline between now and 2030.
ECITB Chief Executive Andrew Hockey said: “A key objective of the Foundations pillar of our Leading Industry Learning strategy is to produce impactful labour market intelligence to enable data-driven decision-making.
“The significant Census response rate enabled the ECITB to provide more precise, up-to-date data for the benefit of industry. It allows us to improve the LFT to help make better predictions on future workforce trends and labour demands in the oil and gas sector.
“The updates to the LFT reinforce the scale of the challenges facing oil and gas that were outlined by the tool when it was first launched. In 2023, the LFT predicted the sector’s share of the overall ECI workforce could fall to 20% by 2035 due to a combination of a rise in other sectors and a decline in production.
“This further highlights the importance of transitioning the oil and gas workforce into sectors that will be key to meeting the country’s net-zero commitments. The LFT predicts a big increase in demand for workers in renewables, hydrogen, carbon capture and nuclear in the next five years.
“However, the Census report suggests that even with this predicted decline in workforce numbers, the oil and gas sector may still face hiring challenges, particularly for site-based roles such as electrical technicians, health and safety specialists and riggers, due to a high proportion of workers nearing or past retirement age.
“It highlighted that workers over 50 make up 41% of the oil and gas workforce, with those aged over 60 making up 18%.
“We recognise that addressing these challenges requires a collaborative, multi-agency approach that includes employers, governments, training providers and the ECITB.
“So, we’re calling on industry to work together to help increase the pool of people joining the ECI, while continuing to upskill and reskill existing workers.
“One such example is the pilot programme we launched with the Global Wind Organisation and the Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult. This cross-skill programme will support worker transferability between oil & gas and wind operations and maintenance.
“By investing in the workforce, the industry has a fighting chance of ensuring it has the skilled workforce it needs both for now and the future.”
Find out more about the ECITB Labour Forecasting Tool at:
