Drilling engineer

Drilling engineers are vital to the petroleum industry, managing the safe and efficient drilling of wells to procure oil or gas

As a drilling engineer, you'll plan, develop and supervise the operations necessary for drilling oil and gas wells. You'll be involved from the initial well design to testing, completion and abandonment, and will have a responsibility for costing.

In this role you can work on land, on offshore platforms or on mobile drilling units, employed either by the operating oil company, a specialist drilling contractor or a service company.

You'll work with other professionals, such as geologists and geoscientists, to monitor drilling progress, oversee safety management and ensure the protection of the environment.

Responsibilities

As a drilling engineer, you'll need to:

• prepare well data sheets
• design and select well-head equipment
• draw up drilling programmes, taking account of desired production flow rates
• obtain relevant data, carrying out engineering analysis on site, recommending necessary actions and writing up reports
• monitor the daily progress of well operations
• keep track of current daily costs, comparing actual costs with expenditure proposals and recommending cost-effective changes
• liaise with specialist contractors and suppliers, such as cement companies or suppliers of drilling fluids
• monitor safety and ensure the good maintenance of the well
• adhere to environmental protection standards, in some cases through direct discussion with local governments to ensure compliance with legislative requirements
• establish and administer drilling and service contracts
• coordinate and supervise the work of the drilling team
• undertake engineering design and the planning of wells (including development work)
• design directional well paths (horizontally or multi-laterally, as appropriate)
• manage operations on behalf of small clients
• contribute to conceptual field development design
• work with multidisciplinary professionals to evaluate the commercial viability of the well and monitor progress during drilling
• return the site to its natural environmental setting if drilling isn't pursued.

Salary

• Graduate starting salaries are £30,000 to £40,000.
• Experience drilling engineers, with increased responsibility, can earn in the region of £60,000 to £90,000. Salaries vary depending on the size of your employer.
• Some senior/global roles pay £100,000+

Your location and assignments influence your salary. Additional benefits and overseas allowances may be available. Oil drilling takes place in some dangerous areas of the world - in these situations, extra payments may be made.

Income figures are intended as a guide only.

Working hours

In the North Sea, offshore working hours are normally 12 hours on and 12 hours off continuously for two weeks, followed by a break ashore of two to three weeks.

You may be summoned to work on a rig at short notice.

If you work overseas you might work on rotation, spending up to two months onsite followed by a break of one month at home.

What to expect

• You'll often be required to work offshore or in remote areas, but office-based roles are available too.
• Working on offshore rigs is physically demanding, and is often undertaken in dirty, wet and noisy conditions. The weather may also be unpleasant.
• Living conditions on most rigs are very comfortable. Rigs usually accommodate 50 to 100 people. Rooms are compact and are frequently shared with a colleague working the opposite 12-hour shift, so you'll rarely see your roommate. All meals and laundry services are provided. Regular facilities include a gym and snooker room with access to computers and DVDs. Alcohol is prohibited on the rig.
• Oil and gas exploration is an international activity and drilling engineers are also increasingly involved in decommissioning projects and geothermal energy. The work of a drilling engineer can take you all over the world, from Africa to Eastern Europe and the Middle East.
• Travel to different rigs by helicopter is normal (sometimes at short notice), so flexibility is required. Travel to sites in other parts of the world can be complex and difficult.

Qualifications

This area of work is open to all engineering graduates, but certain subjects may improve your chances of securing work. A strict 2:1 minimum is less rigid than it once was. Employers may still prefer it, but some will accept a 2:2.

Relevant subjects include:

• petroleum or mining engineering
• offshore engineering
• mechanical engineering
• civil or structural engineering
• chemical engineering
• marine engineering
• minerals engineering.

Entry with a HND alone is not possible.

A geoscience degree, such as geology or geophysics may also be useful.

A relevant postgraduate qualification, such as an MSc or MEng in petroleum, offshore or energy engineering is valued by employers. While not essential, it can strengthen your technical expertise, support career progression into more senior roles and improve your competitiveness in the job market. Particularly useful for international roles or research-focused work.

However, a postgraduate degree does not guarantee employment, so it's important to research what individual employers are looking for before committing to further study.

Search postgraduate courses in offshore engineering.

Given the international nature of the work, foreign language skills could be an asset.

Skills

You'll need to have:

• strong communication and interpersonal skills, as well as the ability to build and maintain relationships with a range of people
• a good technical understanding of the scientific principles of disciplines such as geology, physics, maths and chemistry
• a high level of numeracy and IT skills
• the analytical ability to think through potentially complex problems and develop solutions
• initiative and drive
• teamwork skills and the ability to cooperate with others
• sensitivity to different cultures and ways of working
• the ability to work under pressure.

Work experience

Some major oil companies and contractors offer placements during the summer holiday of your penultimate year, where you can work on a project of operational significance. Successful completion of the project and the chance to network with people in the field may provide good contacts when looking for work after graduation.

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. You may find initial entry to the industry easier as a mudlogger before moving up the ranks to become a drilling engineer.

Find out more about the different kinds of work experience and internships that are available.

Employers

Major oil companies can advertise vacancies almost a year in advance, but it's also worth making speculative applications to specialist companies directly.

Recruitment is affected by oil price fluctuations. Despite the declining North Sea reserves, the basin remains active as a mature field with a focus on late-life asset management and decommissioning. Drilling specialists are in high demand in the UK, as well as the rest of the world.

Many jobs are based overseas, so major employers recruit internationally. Some applicants come from the US and Europe, where university education lasts longer and a higher degree is the normal qualification for entry to a professional career.

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. Alongside traditional oil and gas, there is growing crossover into geothermal drilling, carbon capture and storage (CCS) and hydrogen projects.

Typical employers include:

• oil operation and production companies, especially large international ones, although some are smaller and lesser-known
• engineering consultancies
• integrated service providers, which provide staff in varied disciplines
• specialist drilling contractors, which undertake drilling work on an international scale and often operate and maintain their own mobile drilling rigs.

Recruitment, training patterns and job titles vary from company to company - this is particularly true in relation 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.

Self-employment is possible but not very common.

Look for job vacancies at:

• Earthworks-jobs
• Oil and Gas People
• Petroplan
• Rigzone

Careers sections of major oil and gas companies' websites may list details of graduate recruitment schemes as well as other jobs.

You may also find recruitment agencies a helpful source of temporary and permanent jobs, and it's worth sending speculative applications to specialist companies.

For appropriate contacts check out the:

• Drilling Engineer Association Europe (DEAe)
• International Association of Drilling Contractors (IADC)

Professional development

Many drilling engineers join structured graduate programmes, which are designed to support progression towards Chartered Engineer (CEng) status through professional bodies such as:

• Institution of Chemical Engineers (IChemE)
• Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining (IOM3)
• Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE)
• Energy Institute

These programmes often include mentoring, giving new graduates access to guidance and support from experienced engineers.

Where graduate schemes are not offered, employers usually provide formal training tailored to the role, combined with practical rig-site experience. Broader skills development, such as people management, may also be available.

Continuing professional development (CPD) is encouraged across the industry, with opportunities to attend courses, build international networks and access study facilities offshore. In smaller companies, you may need to take greater responsibility for arranging and funding your own training, particularly on temporary contracts.

All drilling engineers must complete mandatory safety and survival training, typically a three-to-five day course delivered in specialist centres (commonly in Aberdeen). This covers first aid, survival skills, safety and environmental awareness, and includes the helicopter underwater escape training (HUET) exercise, where participants practice escaping from a submerged, upturned helicopter simulator.

Membership of professional bodies such as the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) and the Energy Institute is helpful for your professional development. Through it, you can keep up to date with industry developments, connect with other professionals, and access training and events to support your development.

Career prospects

If you start your career with a large oil company, you may initially manage a single well under supervision. Progress can be rapid, and you could soon take responsibility for drilling and production operations on several wells - often beginning offshore before moving onshore.

Graduate training programmes typically last up to five years. During this time, you'll usually rotate between jobs or projects every 18 months to two years, which may also involve relocating.

Career paths vary by employer. In oil companies, progression is often towards management, while in drilling contractors you're more likely to remain in a technical role, applying specialist expertise to develop new drilling technologies. Independent consultancy is another option, though it can involve balancing periods of high demand with leaner times.

Commonly progression involves spending around two to four years offshore or at an onshore wellsite before moving into an office-based design role. This can eventually lead to overseas assignments, sometimes on a rotational basis (e.g. one month on, one month off).

Career stability is strongly influenced by oil and gas market cycles, though skills are transferable into renewables, mining and civil engineering. Experience in decommissioning and low-carbon energy projects may improve your long-term career security.