TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT
SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT SUPPORTS DIVER AND ROV SKILLS TRAINING TO ADDRESS FUTURE SKILLS SHORTAGE
Skills Development Scotland has awarded The Underwater Centre in Fort William funding to help ensure that Scotland is ready to supply the qualified workforce that the subsea industry will need in the future.
There is growing concern that the subsea industry could face major skills shortages in coming years. The downturn in the oil and gas industry has led to a reduction in training, both by individuals and companies. Without ongoing investment in training, skills will be lost to the industry as older workers retire without the skilled workforce to replace them.
The Scottish Government is taking action to support subsea training now so that the country’s workforce is ready to respond to positive market conditions
when the oil price begins to recover, as well as being prepared for opportunities in decommissioning and the offshore renewables sector.
Starting in June 2017, Scottish residents* will be able to get high-quality, industry- relevant closed bell and ROV training at The Underwater Centre for 50% of the usual cost. The other half of the fees will be paid by Skills Development Scotland.
With industry needs in mind, the financial support is targeted towards the specific areas where there are likely to be shortages. The support is not seeking to bring new people into the offshore industry but is aiming to increase the capability of the people already in the sector.
Steve Ham, Commercial Director at The
Underwater Centre, believes that the support offers huge benefits to the Scottish subsea workforce:
While none of us have a crystal ball, there are increasing signs that the upturn is coming. We believe that this Scottish Government support for subsea skills training will help companies benefit more quickly and more effectively from that upturn. It will also help individuals advance their own careers by making it easier to invest in themselves.
*A resident is someone who has been resident in Scotland for at least the last 12 months.
INDUSTRY AND SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT BACK OIL & GAS RESOURCE TO TACKLE LOOMING EXPERIENCE AND KNOWLEDGE GAP
A major digital resource developed for the oil and gas industry, has received £50,000 from the Scottish Government.
This supplements the £800,000 received from industry, the universities and other sponsors to enable the research, development and launch of this multi-disciplinary project.
The International Centre for Oil and the Environment (ICOE) is working with industry, academia and regulators to produce this authoritative resource for today and tomorrow’s industry leaders. This platform captures the accumulated knowledge and inter-disciplinary expertise of the last 40 years of offshore operations to transfer it to the next generation.
Entitled Encompassing the Future: Offshore Oil & Gas Operations, Environment Safety and Performance Management, the resource pulls together authoritative and researched material on the successful development of the North Sea offshore. Covering best practice, this digital resource will enable practitioners to meet the challenges of producing and operating safely
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and without harm to the environment in a cost effective manner.
William Cairns, Executive Chairman, ICOE Research Limited, said that the resource will distil and develop the intellectual and operational expertise of the industry, and promote access and collaboration between industry, academia and regulators. It will create a safer, innovative and more competitive management approach to and facilitate evolution of best practice.
Paul Warwick, Chairman of ICOE’s advisory council, said: “Against a backdrop of oil price volatility, a shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources and the gradual loss of experience in maturing and increasingly-challenging provinces, the global oil and gas industry is entering one of its most defining periods.
“The loss of personnel through today’s and previous downturns has created a gap in knowledge and experience. Our survivability and sustainability depend upon filling this vacuum.
“ICOE’s resource will help close the knowledge and experience gap by providing expert
guidance on the best solutions to the challenges of low morale, knowledge loss, ageing infrastructure and declining investor confidence as a result of the urgent need to bring costs to more realistic and sustainable levels in a lower for longer oil price environment.”
Paul Wheelhouse, Scottish Government Minister for Business, Innovation and Energy said: “I am pleased to have the opportunity of supporting this ambitious project which seeks to harness the knowledge and expertise built up by the North Sea industry. This is a resource that is being created by industry, for industry. It will provide a comprehensive evidence base to ensure that efforts to tackle inefficiencies and change behaviours all draw on best practice experience for environmental and safety performance. This project has the opportunity to capture a wealth of knowledge, which will be of significant value to the industry going forward”
The accumulated knowledge built up in the North Sea over the past 40 years has been trawled, re-assessed and distilled to build a global offshore resource which will be launched on August 3rd at Kings College, University of Aberdeen
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