Energy-industry managers agree on some trends: 53% of executives expect a rise in employment, 31% predict difficultly in hiring and retention and 60% foresee an increase in capital expenditures.

For the oil and gas industry—upstream, in particular—all of the numbers are down year-over-year, according to the 11th Survey of Upstream U.S. Energy Companies commissioned by Grant Thornton in partnership with Hart Energy.

But at center stage is the bigger concern that natural gas and crude oil prices in 2013 and years to come are stuck in a rut or will fall.

“The No. 1 concern is price uncertainty,” Brandon Sear, national energy practice leader, Grant Thornton, said at Hart Energy’s recent Energy Capital Conference in Houston.

Sear said that price volatility significantly impacts the energy industry.

“These persistent cost issues are impacting capital-spending decisions and leading many of our respondents to indicate a reliance on hedging production as insurance against price fluctuations again this year,” he said.

The survey of E&P, midstream and oilfield services executives found respondents do not think average gas prices of $4 per thousand cubic feet (Mcf) of gas will solidify until 2015.

The survey found that 2013 gas-price expectations were about $3.48 per Mcf.

But the predictions get more extreme. By 2015, the minimum price was put at $2.50 and the maximum at $8. Oil prices, too, range in the same period from $70 West Texas Intermediate to $170 per barrel (bbl.).

“There’s a lot of difference of belief in the variability of gas prices in 2013, '14 and '15," Sear said.

Exploration and acreage acquisitions again rate as top priorities for the survey’s respondents.

However, due to price volatility, only 60% of respondents expect an increase in capital expenditures during 2013—down from 63% in 2012.

Companies still prefer to fund operations through private equity and debt instruments, the survey found. However, respondents indicated joint ventures would become more common, with 49% of respondents citing use of that strategy in 2013, compared to 35%.

Employment appears to be level for the energy industry, as more than half of respondents expect employment to rise for the remainder of 2013. That’s in contrast to 2012, when 71% expected the rate to increase.

“The meteoric rise in the last couple of years is going to start leveling off for hiring in the energy industry,” said Brandon Cradeur, Grant Thornton’s national energy transaction advisory lead.

The survey found that exploration and acquisition of key acreage top respondents’ view of opportunities.

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