North Sea supply chain glitters at awards while real work outlook dims
Scottish renewables winners celebrated, but a new report shows basin businesses losing faith in offshore wind and CCS work.
Scottish Renewables handed out eight Scottish Green Energy Supply Chain Awards on Thursday (2026-05-28), celebrating companies that have made "outstanding contributions" to the country's renewable energy industry.2 The trade body gathered sector leaders from across the supply chain to honour achievements in a basin the UK government wants to turn into a clean energy powerhouse.
That night of optimism sat awkwardly against data published just three days earlier. A new report from the region's chamber of commerce found that businesses traditionally reliant on the North Sea are increasingly looking abroad for work.1 Major oil and gas operators told researchers they will continue to cut spending in the basin, and the numbers on future activity are moving in the wrong direction.
Expectation that offshore wind will provide valuable work in the next five years fell to 4.6% from 8.4% last year.1 Carbon capture and storage was even weaker, with just 2.8% of respondents expecting it to be a meaningful activity over the same period, down from 5.9% in the prior survey.1 Decommissioning remains an opportunity in theory but a disappointment in practice — only 8.8% see it increasing over five years, compared with 12.1% last year.1
The chamber's 43rd annual Energy Transition report did find that 93% of businesses still agree there is a future for oil and gas in the North Sea — but only if the UK gets the fiscal and regulatory settings right.1 That is a conditional vote of confidence, not a ringing endorsement of the current trajectory.
Some firms are still hiring. Just over half of energy services companies expect staff numbers in the region to rise, though one in four still plan to cut jobs.1 The longer-term skills picture is more troubling: fewer than 10% of respondents are confident the UK will have the necessary workforce to deliver the energy transition, while 40% believe it will not.1
The awards spotlight the supply chain's successes, but the report captures a growing gap between political ambition and commercial reality on the ground. Big-ticket investments continue — Mubadala took a $200m stake in the Greenlink interconnector between Ireland and Great Britain on Thursday (2026-06-17) and last month put $325m into the 2.9GW Hornsea 3 offshore wind farm.3 Those are headline numbers for project developers, not for the local service firms that the chamber surveyed.
Politics may now shift the backdrop. With Prime Minister Keir Starmer stepping down, Andy Burnham is the frontrunner to lead Labour and take No. 10 later this month (July 2026).4 Burnham, known as the "King of the North" for his Greater Manchester base, has been more vocal than Starmer on regional industrial policy. Whether that translates into a more supportive regime for North Sea supply chain companies is far from settled.
The IEA's Fatih Birol said on Monday (2026-07-13) that Europe's slow electrification since the 2022 energy crisis was a "major mistake."5 For the businesses gathered at the Scottish Green Energy Awards, electrification speed is secondary to whether they will still have the skills and the contracts to participate when it eventually arrives.