Drilling engineer
A drilling engineer develops, plans, costs, schedules and supervises the operations necessary in the process of drilling oil and gas wells. They are involved from initial well design to testing, completion and abandonment. Engineers are employed on land, on offshore platforms or on mobile drilling units either by the operating oil company, a specialist drilling contractor or a service company.
The role can involve administering drilling and service contracts, engineering design, the planning of wells and supervising the drilling crew on site.
Drilling engineers work with other professionals, such as geologists and geoscientists, to monitor drilling progress, oversee safety management and ensure the protection of the environment.
Tasks may vary according to the employer but will often include:
Although this area of work is open to all engineering graduates, the following subjects may increase your chances:
A degree in geology or natural sciences may also be advantageous. A good first degree (minimum 2:1) is required for entry to major oil companies' graduate training programmes, and undergraduate masters (MEng) degrees are usually preferred. Entry with an HND alone is not possible.
A relevant pre-entry postgraduate qualification can be useful but is not a guarantee of a job due to the high level of competition. Any student considering postgraduate study should investigate carefully the need for and relevance of the proposed course to their intended career. An MSc in petroleum or offshore engineering, for example, may improve your chances.
Pre-entry experience is not essential, but any experience working on rigs or in an onshore yard is likely to be useful and demonstrate your interest and motivation.
Candidates need to show evidence of the following:
Given the international nature of the work, a basic knowledge of foreign languages may be an asset.
Some major oil companies and contractors offer placements during the summer vacation of your penultimate year where you can work on a project of operational significance. Successful completion of the project may give you an advantage in the recruitment process for a permanent post.
Major oil companies advertise vacancies almost a year in advance, but it is also worth making speculative applications to specialist companies directly. Competition is keen, and recruitment is affected by oil price fluctuations. You may find initial entry to the industry easier as a mudlogger before moving up the ranks to drilling engineer.
The exploration and extraction business is worldwide. Many of the jobs are based overseas, so major employers recruit internationally. Many applicants come from the United States and Europe, where university education lasts longer and a higher degree is the normal qualification for entry to a professional career.
Normal entry is as a new graduate or in the early stages of your career.
For more information, see work experience and internships and search courses and research.
Formal training in areas specific to the job, as well as more general management skills, complements practical, hands-on, rig-site experience. Major oil companies have well-established graduate training programmes. These programmes help drilling engineers meet the requirements of the professional engineering institutions in order to gain chartered engineer (CEng) status through bodies such as the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) , the Institution of Chemical Engineers (IChemE) or the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining (IOM3) .
A mentoring system is often available to allow new graduates to access the advice and professional support of more senior engineers. Continuing professional development (CPD) is supported at a variety of locations - allowing graduates to build networks with international colleagues. Study facilities are also available offshore on oil platforms.
If you are working for a smaller company, you may find that you need to take responsibility for arranging and funding your own development and training, particularly if you are employed on a temporary contract basis.
Safety and survival training is obligatory. This usually takes three to five days and is carried out at specialist training facilities in Aberdeen. The course covers first aid, survival training, general safety and environmental awareness. Participants must pass an underwater helicopter escape course, which involves submersion and escape from an upturned helicopter simulator.
If you begin your drilling engineer career with one of the large oil companies, you may initially manage a single well under supervision. However, fairly quickly, you could become responsible for wells involving budgets of £5-10million. As you gain in experience and seniority, you could take on the overall supervision for the drilling and production operations on several wells - initially offshore and then moving onshore.
Typically, training programmes last up to five years. You will usually be expected to change jobs/projects every 18 months to 2 years, which may also mean changing location.
Career progression in oil companies is usually into management. However, with drilling contractor work, engineers tend to remain in a technical role, using their expertise to access and develop the most appropriate technology for drilling in the future. Independent consultancy is another option, although you will need to work hard to balance the good times with the less prosperous periods.
A typical career path could involve working for two to four years offshore or on an onshore wellsite and then moving into an office-based design role. This path might eventually lead to working in an overseas office following a one month on, one month off pattern.
Drilling is the aspect of oil exploration most affected by the economic climate. Changes in the economic climate may affect opportunities for career development. Activity is in response to the decisions of the oil companies as to where drilling will take place.
Other similar roles to that of drilling engineer include cementing/stimulation engineer, completion engineer and subsea engineer.
The largest and most easily developed oil fields have now been discovered and are past their production peak. However, it is estimated that over 40% of the UK’s reserves are yet to be recovered.
In the UK, activity is currently located mainly off the east coast of England and Scotland, but exploration is also being carried out in the western approaches, the Irish Sea and west of the Shetlands.
Oil exploration is an international activity and the work of a drilling engineer can take you all over the world.
Typical employers include:
Recruitment, training patterns and job titles vary from company to company; this is particularly true with regard to the extraction phase. For example, some employers do not distinguish at entry level between petroleum, drilling and support engineering. Instead, preferring to recruit people with wide potential and deploy them after training where individual preference and company need coincide.
You may find recruitment agencies a helpful source of temporary and permanent jobs. It is also worth sending speculative applications to specialist companies. Check out the Drilling Engineer Association Europe (DEAe) and the International Association of Drilling Contractors (IADC) for appropriate contacts.
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