Around 300 miles from the North Sea oil basin, wind turbines off the Yorkshire coast are quietly powering a revolution in the UK’s engineering workforce. Already over a third of the marine engineers working offshore as part of the UK’s growing renewable energy industry have made the move from oil and gas, and jobs statistics tell the tale of two very different industries.

Today, the price of oil is less than half 2014’s level, when North Sea jobs stood 450,000. Last year the number of jobs supported by the UK’s oil and gas industry fell by an estimated 84,000 to around 370,000, and they are forecast to fall a further 40,000 by the end of this year.

By contrast the latest government data show that companies in the wind and marine energy sector have a combined turnover of more than £8bn and nearly two in five have struggled to fill vacancies.

During the oil industry’s boom years, the exploration sector stole away workers from multiple other industries, by paying a premium to work in farflung locations. Now that trend is due to reverse.

Maf Smith, deputy chief executive of RenewableUK, says “huge numbers” of skilled workers will be needed in the UK’s growing renewable energy industry in the coming years.