2026 Offshore Energy Industry’s Innovation & Workforce Excellence Report

Danos launched Develop U to create a clearer pathway for employee development, competency growth, and career advancement. The voluntary program combines individual competency assessments with customized learning plans, hands-on education, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence to help employees strengthen the skills they need in the field.

Initially piloted with production operators in the Gulf of America, Develop U is designed to support both employee growth and customer demand for highly skilled, safety-focused personnel. Danos plans to expand the model to additional crafts and incorporate technologies including microlearning, gaming-based education, and adaptive training.

Fugro is combining environmental DNA (eDNA) with remote survey and automated sampling technologies to provide a faster, less intrusive way to understand marine biodiversity. By analyzing genetic material naturally left behind by organisms in seawater, eDNA can provide insight into species presence and ecosystem conditions without relying solely on traditional physical surveys.

Integrating eDNA collection into remote offshore operations can reduce vessel time and offshore exposure while improving the quality and frequency of environmental data. Fugro is applying the technology across offshore energy projects in the United States and internationally.

Oceaneering is integrating remote operations, subsea robotics, simulation, workforce development, and community engagement into how offshore work is planned and performed.

The company’s Liberty™ Resident System enables subsea inspection, monitoring, and intervention while reducing the need for repeated vessel mobilizations and offshore personnel exposure. Oceaneering also uses physics-based subsea simulation to rehearse complex operations onshore, identify risks before execution, train personnel, and improve operational readiness.

These technologies are complemented by workforce development, employee engagement, community partnerships, and operational initiatives designed to improve efficiency and environmental performance across Oceaneering’s global operations.

OEG provides infrastructure assets, technologies, and services supporting energy operations around the world. Its approach emphasizes asset reuse, preventative maintenance, operational efficiency, workforce training, and community engagement.

OEG’s cargo carrying units are maintained and redeployed throughout their operating lives, supporting a circular approach to offshore equipment. In the Gulf, the company’s Recycle the Gulf program helps offshore operators separate recyclable waste, with collected materials benefiting Arc of Iberia and its work supporting individuals with disabilities.

OEG is also investing in workforce skills through industry-recognized training programs. In 2025, its training center delivered more than 6,000 courses for individuals and organizations working in renewable energy.

Promethean Energy is applying digital technology and a new generation of talent to the challenge of safely and responsibly retiring offshore infrastructure in the Gulf of America.

The company uses tools including drone inspections, visual AI monitoring, digital twins, automated data systems, and proactive safety analytics to improve situational awareness, regulatory compliance, and project execution. At the same time, Promethean is recruiting digitally fluent early-career professionals and giving them opportunities to apply these technologies directly to offshore decommissioning challenges.

The result is a workforce strategy that connects environmental stewardship, operational performance, digital innovation, and professional development.

RTI Offshore has developed a closed-loop topside decontamination approach designed to make offshore decommissioning safer, faster, and more predictable.

The system combines closed-loop circulation, vapor-phase chemistry, and engineered containment to reduce or eliminate some of the highest-risk activities associated with traditional decontamination. The approach eliminates confined-space entry for the cleaning process, reduces waste, shortens project schedules, and provides greater cost certainty through lump-sum execution.

In a Gulf of America project highlighted in the report, RTI Offshore’s approach resulted in significantly faster execution, lower total cost exposure, zero confined-space entries, and substantially less waste compared with traditional cleaning methods.

The Metals Company (TMC) is developing polymetallic nodule resources in the deep ocean through an approach centered on scientific research, environmental monitoring, offshore technology, and transparent governance.

TMC has invested more than $700 million in environmental baseline research, technology testing, and impact assessment. Working with universities, research institutions, and offshore engineering partner Allseas, the company has developed and tested a robotic nodule collection system designed for extreme deep-sea conditions.

The company is also working through the longstanding U.S. regulatory framework established under the Deep Seabed Hard Mineral Resources Act and investing in education, workforce development, and community partnerships across the Pacific.

TGS combines energy data, geoscience, environmental monitoring, and advanced technology to support offshore energy development while improving understanding of the marine environment.

In Brazil, the company is using seismic surveys, environmental baseline studies, acoustic monitoring, drones, photo identification, telemetry, and other technologies to build environmental knowledge around emerging offshore regions. Its work has also supported local scientific capacity and marine conservation efforts, including a manatee rehabilitation and release initiative led by Brazil’s environmental agency.

The case study demonstrates how energy data and environmental data can work together to support informed offshore development and long-term environmental stewardship.

USA Energy Workers focuses on the people behind America’s offshore energy industry, connecting workers, companies, communities, educators, and policymakers through advocacy, education, and storytelling.

Through the Balancing the 3Es® framework—Environment, Energy, and Economy—the organization uses podcasts, digital media, worker profiles, presentations, commentary, and coalition engagement to highlight offshore safety, environmental stewardship, workforce opportunities, and the role energy workers play in supporting American energy production.

Its work also emphasizes workforce recruitment, family and community support, and bringing frontline operational experience into broader conversations about offshore energy.

Woodside Energy partnered with the University of Texas at Austin’s Center for Energy and Environmental Resources to evaluate methane measurement technologies at its Shenzi offshore facility in the Gulf of America.

The study tested several commercially available technologies—including satellite, aerial, drone, and handheld systems—under consistent offshore operating conditions. The work allowed Woodside to compare the capabilities and limitations of different measurement methods and identify more efficient approaches to detecting emissions sources.

The findings are helping inform Woodside’s development of a longer-term methane monitoring, reporting, and verification strategy across its global operated portfolio.