Energy Industry Recruiting & Job Opportunities
For current and incoming Geology and Geophysics Graduate Students
To plan ahead and have the best chance of success, please read on to assess your interest and follow the instructions
Important note: These companies, like ExxonMobil and Chevron, largely hire for full time positions out of their summer intern pool only, so completing a summer internship is the most common route to a full time hire as a geoscientist. So finishing your degree and then interviewing for a full time position is not a common route. It’s usually late. Recruiting is all about relationship building over the length of your graduate career and most commonly starts as soon as when you arrive on campus @ the U.
Why would I interview for a summer 2026 internship with a major energy company? Perhaps you haven’t thought to do this.
- In the short term, if you get a summer internship offer you accept, you can nearly double your 9 month graduate stipend with a 10 week summer internship.
- You gain new skills in an applied environment that will better tool you wherever you take your career.
- You dip your toes in the water to understand what it’s like in the energy industry.
- Interview practice and networking. It’s never too early to practice. And you never know what networking connections will pay off later.
Does my graduate research need to be related to the energy industry?
No, the energy industry is looking for broadly trained, creative geoscientists that have strong basic geoscience and quantitative skills. Plus, no matter what your research focus, you could take a graduate course our two in our curriculum that help give you some basic terminology and concepts to be successful at an energy industry internship. Two examples this fall semester would be: GEO 6920 - 004 Geoscience for Energy & GEO 6920 - 003 Geological Hydrogen, but several others would be great too.
Why would I consider a career in the energy industry?
- Geoscientists at energy companies generally get to do really cool science in a well-resourced working environment. Code for funded research/science(!)
- You work with a team of well-trained, really smart geoscientists, like yourselves, for most of your career.
- Career satisfaction is commonly high, with generous compensation.
- You are a trained geoscientist. Your skills are needed to innovate and solve our energy needs, while also still fully understanding and addressing environmental and climate challenges. Use your skills to be part of a solution working within industry.