Fracking is a New and Practical College Degree
A new fracking degree is being offered by an Illinois community college.
Lizzie Johnson of the Chicago Tribune reports.
Community college to create fracking degree program
A southwestern Illinois community college has received the go-ahead to create a petroleum drilling technology, or fracking, program.
Lincoln Trail College in Robinson, Ill., will enroll its first students this fall. The college petitioned the state for the degree and received approval this month.
“We are very rich in oil in this part of the state,” said Lincoln Trail College President Kathryn Harris last week. “The degree will focus on new ways and technologies to extract oil. We want to be ready when the oil boom comes to southern Illinois.”
It has been two months since Illinois approved and enacted rules for high-volume oil and gas drilling. Denver-based Strata-X Energy is the only company that has registered with the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, but it has not formally applied to begin fracking.
Fracking will be an emphasis in the two-year associate degree program. The process involves using technology to drill into shale rock and retrieve oil or gas using a high-pressure mixture of water and chemicals.
The current drop in oil prices has led to layoffs in some regions of the country, and Harris said low prices could affect the job market.
“I prefer we be dependent on our own oil over foreign oil,” she said. “It’s hard to make money when the price has dropped.”
Despite the plunge in prices, the extraction field is expected to grow domestically, according to the Illinois Department of Employment Security. It predicts a 23.2 percent increase for oil and gas roustabouts, or oil rig personnel, a 23.6 percent increase for drill operators and a 24.1 percent increase for derrick operators through 2022.
“There’s a huge need for petroleum workers, and we can’t fill them fast enough,” said Robert Conn, former dean of instruction at Lincoln Trail College and current dean of instruction at Wabash Valley College in Mount Carmel, Ill. “The price in oil fluctuates so much. Anything can happen, that’s the interesting thing. The economy will push fracking here. This is just a little hiccup to try to slow down U.S. production.”
Comments
Hydraulic fracturing is a well stimulation technology – part of the well completion that follows drilling, casing and (often) cementing the production string. It is incorrect to indicate this degree is in hydraulic fracturing, because it is likely a drilling and completions focus. Get the jargon straight. There is nothing new about hydraulic fracturing – the industry has been doing it since 1947!