- Undergraduate enrollment in petroleum engineering is down 75% since 2014, WSJ reported.
- That's despite the fact that the average petroleum engineering grad makes 40% more than a computer science grad.
Petroleum engineers can make big money — but right now there aren't a lot of takers for the gig.
New student enrollment in petroleum-engineering programs — the sector of engineering related to oil and gas extraction — is at its lowest since before the fracking boom of the 2010s, and since 2014, the number of undergraduates studying petroleum engineering has fallen 75%, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing Texas Tech University professor Lloyd Heinze's annual survey of petroleum engineering programs.
Undergraduate enrollment in the University of Oklahoma's petroleum-engineering program is down 90% since its peak in 2015, according to Heinze's findings, which he also shared with Insider. Other schools like Louisiana State University and Colorado School of Mines have seen similar declines since the mid-2010s.
The number of graduates in the field isn't much better — that total dropped by more than 50% between 2016 and 2021, per US Department of Education data cited by the WSJ.
That's despite the fact that the average petroleum-engineer graduate earns 40% more than the average computer science grad, the WSJ reported. The 2021 median salary for petroleum engineers was $130,850 annually, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics reported.
Young students are shying away from the industry, in part, due to concerns about climate change and the industry's long-term prospects, analysts, executives and professors who spoke with the WSJ said.
"People are concerned they won't have a job in 10 to 20 years," one petroleum-engineering student at the Colorado School of Mines told the WSJ, though he added that "even if oil and gas is going away, I can deploy my skills in other engineering fields."
Some of the academic field's professors who spoke to the Journal of Petroleum Technology in March expressed optimism about the career prospects of current graduating classes.
Heinze told the Journal of Petroleum Technology that over 90% of petroleum-engineering students at Texas Tech have jobs right after graduation. He added in comments to Insider that the industry's starting salaries are higher now than they were in previous years.
And new workers do seem to care about salary: In a June survey by the CFA Institute, 62% of Gen Z undergraduate students and graduates who were polled said a "good salary" is a top priority when looking for an employer.
But when it came to picking which career paths were most attractive, the Gen Zers surveyed ranked finance as the most promising industry regarding career prospects. Education was ranked the second-most popular industry when it came to career prospects, and STEM, which includes engineering, was ranked fifth.