Trade skills are necessary to power the shift to clean energy and pursue the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals, according to global consulting and management firm McKinsey & Company.
Within the green economy, experts have discussed at length the green skills gap. With the burgeoning number of job vacancies in emerging industries such as renewable energy, agritech, and more, there aren’t enough workers with the skills needed to fit these roles.
However, McKinsey is now bringing to light that trade skills are just as necessary a part of the transition—and why that’s a challenge.
Blue-Collar Jobs and the Green Economy
The key link between what would traditionally be referred to as “blue-collar jobs” and the new, developing green jobs in sustainable sectors is transferability.
Many of the trade skills needed for blue-collar jobs can be easily applied to jobs in the green economy. As McKinsey explains, this is crucial because the 2030 deadline given by the UN for all member states to align with the SDGs is quickly approaching, and millions more workers are necessary for that to happen.
“As the push toward net zero gains momentum, between now and 2030, the global renewables industry will need an additional 1.1 million blue-collar workers to develop and construct wind and solar plants and another 1.7 million workers to operate and maintain them,” McKinsey noted.
“Not only will energy projects require a significant number of skilled-trades workers, but also the skills and capabilities necessary to execute the work will shift, requiring both rapid workforce scale-up and upskilling.”
Addressing Labor Challenges in the Green Sector
The fact that trade skills can easily be applied to green jobs is good news for workers, as labor experts like McKinsey have noted that the massive job losses expected in dying industries like oil and gas will be replaced by new jobs that use those same skills in the green economy.
However, the problem is that the job market is becoming more competitive, and massive numbers of workers with trade skills are retiring—without enough new workers to replenish those numbers.
“As supply declines and demand accelerates, companies are having a harder time finding and retaining skilled-trades labor,” McKinsey noted.
“Moreover, average weekly earnings for construction and manufacturing roles are 23.5% and 20.1%, respectively, above pre-COVID-19 levels.”
At the same time, there is a continuing scarcity of and demand for workers with green skills, which is desperately needed to fill the millions of job vacancies the global green transition is creating.
As McKinsey points out, “with labor both scarcer and more competitive than ever before, the stakes for companies are high.”
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