1. 01/20/2015
• Sadie Grace McLaughlin
• The Source – Spring Semester: Issue One
• Falling Oil Prices and Petroleum Technology Students
•
Oil prices have plummeted globally for the past three months and for the time being,
domestic oil production is not profitable.
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries is a group based primarily in the
Middle East. OPEC is able to set oil prices due to overall wealth of member countries and the
abundance of their resources, said Director of the Energy Institute at the University of Pittsburgh
at Bradford, Dr. Matt Kropf.
According to CNBC, currently oil prices, set by OPEC, are around $46 per barrel.
Saudi Arabia is the leading member of OPEC and is refusing to cut their production. The
drop in oil prices is a power play by Saudi Arabia to force the U.S. to stop drilling so much,
according to Harvey Golubock, president of American Refinery Group Resources.
While this explanation is widely accepted, there are some who believe that a conspiracy,
in which United States and Saudi Arabia have teamed up to put pressure on Russia, is taking
place, said Golubock.
Does the current state of the oil industry solidify a grim future for students in petroleum
technology programs?
“The past few years it’s been quite rosy, I’m afraid that the pendulum has swayed the
other way… Locally independent companies will be doing little to no drilling in 2015,”
Golubock said.
Though its present state is unstable, Golubock and Kropf provided hopeful insights into
the future of the oil industry in America.
“There is still work to be done in drawback periods,” Kropf said.
2. When drilling oil is not particularly profitable, companies take time to retool and repair,
preparing to resume drilling when it becomes feasible again, Kropf said.
“This is a very cyclical business,” Golubock said.
Golubock said that in 1997, when ARG purchased the Kendall / Amalie Refinery in
Bradford, oil was merely $10-15 a barrel.
People looking for work in the petroleum technology field will find themselves in tough
competition and better jobs will be harder to get, Kropf said.
“I think the whole area of energy is something that will occupy our thinking for a long
time, into the future as we transition to more efficient and less environmentally objectionable
sources,” Golubock said.
The oil industry is an aging business, Kropf said, which means that as time goes on the
elder generations of workers will be moving out and making way for younger people to take their
places in the field.
“There are great opportunities and the students that are in the oil and gas technology area
can utilize their backgrounds and maybe refocus their efforts on a broader range of energy
activities to get us over this hump,” Golubock said.
