Video Games Prep Young People to Become M-U Operating Engineers
“Quit playing that @#$% video game!” How often have young people heard that refrain from a parent? Hey parents, you may want to lighten up a bit on the video game thang. The eye-hand coordination and quick thinking skills built by long hours of playing video games are helping youngsters who grow up and enter the work force get jobs operating seriously big pieces of construction equipment used in the Marcellus/Utica, like cranes and earthmovers.
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A few weeks ago the Ohio Oil and Gas Energy Education Program (OOGEEP) published a new resource for those interested in checking out the many (many!) job opportunities there are working in the oil and gas industry. Not a list of open positions at specific companies, but a list of jobs and careers. Everything from administrative assistant and attorney to welder and workover rig supervisor. But this isn’t just a laundry list of 75+ careers/jobs, it includes a detailed explanation of what each job does, the amount and type of education required, and a list of places (in Ohio, of course) where you can receive training for that type of job. This is an awesome resource!
The best teachers (people) and the best teacher (method of instruction) have the same thing in common: Hands on. As in tactile, doing stuff, rather than sitting in a chair attempting to learn by information dumping. Particularly with elementary-age kiddies. Cabot Oil & Gas and Southwestern Energy recently sponsored the annual Vehicular Career Day where 400 fifth graders from school districts across Susquehanna County climbed into big rigs, buses, and emergency vehicles. The shale industry was well-represented. Needless to say, the kids loved it.
A high school student reporter recently turned in an excellent segment for PBS’ News Hour Weekend program about the job opportunities for young people working on pipelines in West Virginia. Among the bits this intrepid young reporter unearthed is something we told you about years ago: Some pipeline welders make salaries of $1,000+ PER DAY! Not a typo.
Yesterday IHS Markit released a study commissioned by Shale Crescent USA and JobsOhio that finds natural gas produced in the tri-state region of Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia will be 45% of the nation’s production by 2040, up from 31% this year. This is truly big news with lots of ramifications.
Last November MDN brought you the exciting news that New Fortress Energy is planning to build an LNG (liquefied natural gas) liquefaction EXPORT plant in landlocked Wyalusing (Bradford County), PA (see 
There’s just no getting around the obvious–that the shale industry is once again heading into something of a dip. We’re not just talking about shale oil drillers scaling back drilling new wells in places like Texas and North Dakota. We’re talking about big gas drillers in the Marcellus/Utica who are signaling that 2019 will see less spending and less drilling, although production won’t decline.
The Independent Oil & Gas Association of West Virginia (IOGAWV) held its annual winter meeting on Tuesday and Wednesday. There was a LOT of talk of WV nabbing the much-talked-about multi-billion dollar NGL storage hub project.
