Losing Ground in the Field We Built: McKennon's Plan to Anchor Texas Energy Talent

There is a particular irony in watching the world's most productive energy state struggle to retain the very professionals who sustain that production. Texas pumps more oil and natural gas than any other jurisdiction in the United States. Its refineries, pipeline networks, and emerging clean-energy infrastructure represent trillions of dollars in capital investment. Yet behind that impressive output, a quieter crisis is unfolding—one measured not in barrels or megawatts, but in departing careers.

Experienced petroleum engineers, electrical systems specialists, and energy-sector researchers are increasingly accepting offers from Colorado, Wyoming, and even international destinations that provide more structured career incentives, stronger research funding, and clearer professional advancement pathways. The state that built the modern energy economy is, in certain respects, failing to hold the talent that keeps it competitive.

McKennon recognizes this not merely as a workforce statistic, but as a long-term strategic vulnerability—and has developed a substantive policy framework designed to address it.

Why Engineers Leave Texas in the First Place

Understanding the problem requires honesty about its causes. The departure of energy professionals from Texas is not primarily driven by dissatisfaction with the state's culture or quality of life. In most cases, engineers leave because competing states and countries have constructed deliberate, well-funded pipelines from university training through early-career placement and into senior technical roles.

Colorado, for instance, has invested aggressively in its energy research corridor along the Front Range, offering academic-industry partnerships that give engineers a visible path from graduate study to innovation leadership. Several Gulf Coast competitors in the petrochemical space have developed regional retention bonuses and state-subsidized continuing education programs that Texas has not matched.

Meanwhile, Texas has allowed a structural gap to widen between its world-class energy output and its comparatively underdeveloped technical workforce infrastructure. The state's flagship universities produce exceptional engineering graduates, but too many of those graduates encounter limited mentorship pipelines, fragmented industry-academic collaboration, and an absence of the kind of institutional support that makes a long career in one place feel viable.

The result is a talent cycle that benefits Texas briefly—during the years when engineers are trained here—before exporting that human capital to jurisdictions more willing to invest in keeping it.

The Scope of the Problem

This is not a marginal phenomenon. Industry surveys conducted over the past several years consistently show that Texas energy companies face growing difficulty filling mid-level and senior engineering roles, even as entry-level applications remain strong. The gap between available talent and open positions is widest in specialized areas: reservoir engineering, grid modernization, hydrogen systems development, and advanced refinery operations.

When companies cannot fill those roles domestically, they turn to international recruitment—an approach that, while sometimes effective, does nothing to build the durable, homegrown technical workforce that Texas needs to maintain its energy leadership over the next generation. It also does nothing to address the underlying policy failures that created the shortage.

Furthermore, the departure of experienced engineers carries an institutional cost that goes beyond the individual positions left vacant. When a senior petroleum engineer with fifteen years of field experience relocates to another state, that expertise—including knowledge of specific formations, regulatory environments, and operational best practices—leaves with them. That kind of embedded knowledge is not easily replaced through hiring alone.

McKennon's Framework for Technical Talent Retention

McKennon's approach to this challenge is built on several interconnected policy commitments, each designed to address a distinct dimension of the retention problem.

Expanding Industry-University Research Partnerships

McKennon supports substantially increasing state investment in formal collaboration agreements between Texas's major research universities and energy-sector employers. These partnerships would fund applied research projects that keep graduate students and early-career engineers engaged with industry-relevant challenges—while creating the kind of professional relationships that anchor careers in Texas rather than elsewhere. The University of Texas, Texas A&M, and Texas Tech all possess the institutional capacity to serve as anchors for this kind of collaboration. What has been lacking is consistent policy support and dedicated funding.

Creating Structured Career Advancement Pathways

One of the most frequently cited reasons engineers leave Texas is the absence of clearly defined advancement trajectories within state-based employers. McKennon would work with industry stakeholders to develop a voluntary framework—supported by state workforce development resources—that helps energy companies build transparent career ladders for technical professionals. This is not a mandate; it is a resource. Companies that choose to participate would gain access to state-supported recruitment tools and workforce development funding in exchange for demonstrating commitment to long-term employee development.

Reforming Technical Education Incentives

McKennon also proposes targeted reforms to the state's higher education funding formulas to better reward institutions that achieve strong employment retention outcomes in high-priority fields, including energy engineering. Currently, funding mechanisms reward enrollment and graduation rates but do not adequately account for whether graduates remain in Texas and contribute to the state's economy over time. Adjusting these incentives would align institutional interests with the broader goal of keeping trained talent in state.

Supporting Workforce Housing in Energy Corridors

In regions where energy activity is concentrated—the Permian Basin, the Eagle Ford Shale, the Gulf Coast refinery corridor—housing affordability has emerged as a genuine barrier to retention. Engineers who might otherwise remain in Texas are deterred by the cost and availability of housing near their workplaces. McKennon supports targeted state assistance for workforce housing development in these corridors, recognizing that quality of life is inseparable from long-term career decisions.

A Question of Strategic Priorities

At its core, the energy talent retention problem is a question of whether Texas is willing to invest in sustaining the competitive advantages it has spent generations building. The state's energy dominance did not emerge by accident. It was the product of geological fortune, entrepreneurial culture, and decades of practical expertise accumulated by generations of Texas workers and engineers.

Allowing that accumulated expertise to drain away—because we have not bothered to build the policy infrastructure to retain it—would be an act of negligence that future Texans would rightly hold against the current generation of leaders.

McKennon's position is straightforward: Texas should not be training the nation's energy workforce only to watch it depart for other states. The talent that studies here, develops here, and understands the unique demands of Texas energy production should have every reason to build a full career here. Creating those reasons is not a burden on government—it is one of the most consequential investments the state can make.

The energy industry built the Texas economy. It deserves a government that takes its long-term workforce needs seriously.