October 5, 2018 - The North-east of Scotland is set for an international boost, as its universities have been named as two of only four European institutions to be chosen by the Mexican Government to work in collaboration with Mexican universities to address the future needs of the country’s energy sector. SENER (Mexico’s Secretary of Energy) this week announced that Robert Gordon University (RGU) and the University of Aberdeen will join Imperial College London and the IFP School in France as the selected universities. Mexico has a longstanding track-record as a hydrocarbon producing country and its government is looking to make strides towards closing a skills gap over the next 30 years, with many of the challenges being highlighted in a skills development framework developed by RGU.
RGU will now work with Instituto Mexicano del Petróleo (IMP), Instituto Politécnico Nacional (IPN), and Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey, for Masters in Drilling & Well Engineering, Masters in Offshore Oil & Gas Engineering, and MBA Oil & Gas respectively. The university has also been awarded a contract to lead on the development of a Mexico:UK Smart Data for energy Research Centre. It is anticipated that the collaboration will extend to assisting in the development of longer term relationships between governments, trade bodies, industry associations and educational institutions in Mexico and the UK and to use lessons learned from the North Sea to support capacity building and operational excellence in both countries.
Aberdeen University’s involvement in the collaboration will see the university deliver a mixture of research and teaching, across engineering and law. In engineering, the University will deliver two research projects – one on a thermally-assisted enhanced oil recovery (EOR) method with Instituto Potosino de Investigación Científica y Tecnológica (IPICYT), and the other on developing methods to assess and monitor the integrity of subsea infrastructure in partnership with Instituto Mexicano del Petróleo (IMP). Meanwhile, the University will also deliver a collaborative MSc in Subsea Engineering with IMP.
In law, the University will work with the Universidad de las Americas Puebla (UDLAP) to deliver a joint LLM program on Oil & Gas Law, and will collaborate with Instituto de Investigaciones Juiridicas (UNAM) and Institutio Teconologico Autonomo de Mexico (ITAM) in a major research project on Hydrocarbon Law, combining socio-legal and economics research in the areas of international arbitration, social licensing and innovation.