Spotlight on the energy skills market: how is the world going green?

Allied to this global headwind is the potential for cross-border brain drain.

According to the Global Wind Energy Council, a further 77,000 offshore wind workers will be needed across the world’s six leading markets by 2024. Countries such as the UK lead the way in offshore wind expertise. However, with such a limited global talent pool – and big requirements from the USA and China – competition for skilled workers is likely to intensify, with attractive compensation set to lure talent away.

Plotting the boom in renewable energy jobs

IRENA’s Renewable Energy and Jobs Annual Review 2021 is a near-100-page tour-de-force of the global renewables landscape.

Overall, worldwide employment in the renewable energy sector increased from 11.5m in 2019 to 12m in 2020. With 4m workers, the solar PV industry dominated, with solar expected to make-up the largest share of renewables jobs by 2050.

Across the board, the solar, bioenergy, hydropower and wind power industries continue to be the largest employers (see below):

Source: IRENA Jobs database

The data and commentary is subject to regional and sector variance.

However, one issue not previously mentioned is diversity. IRENA’s reporting found that only a third of the renewables workforce are women, with gender equity said to be negatively impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic.

A further breakdown reveals that 45% of the women employed in the oil and gas, renewables and wind power workforce are administrative professionals. Meanwhile, 35% are classed as Non-STEM professionals and 28% as STEM professionals.

Green Hydrogen is the next big bet – what’s its job potential?

The emerging green hydrogen market is still in its infancy. However, its application and subsequent job creation potential has become a hot talking point.

According to IRENA’s World Transitions Outlook – which outlines how the world can limit global temperature rises to 1.5°C – green hydrogen is projected to provide a >10% reduction in necessary greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Its potential use in decarbonising ‘hard to abate’ industries, such as transportation, is particularly appealing.

From this perspective, and others involving energy security and green hiring, the idea of producing more hydrogen from renewable sources is gaining traction.

IRENA has gone further still in outlining the case for increased production. Its respective documents, Green Hydrogen for Industry: a guide to policy making and Green Hydrogen Certification Brief  both outline solutions for scaling up its use.

The European Commission is broadly in favour of more green hydrogen as it seeks to move away from imported natural gas. Current pledges include investing $430bn in green hydrogen by 2030.

However, realising its potential will depend on greater cross-body consensus and understanding to overcome cost barriers, technical hurdles and mitigation of carbon leakage risk.

While addressing these issues will challenge policy makers, the calculated benefits to the climate and economy are already becoming more tangible. This is especially true when compared to the medium-term solution offered by blue hydrogen.

With its underlying technology already mature, blue hydrogen lacks the same potential to create an innovative domestic industry with related economic benefits.

In total, estimates predict that the green hydrogen economy could create as many as 1.5m upstream jobs in the EU by 2050.

Meanwhile, IRENA’s Outlook indicates that investment in green hydrogen infrastructure could create around 2m jobs worldwide between 2030 and 2050.

"Blue hydrogen is less interesting from a jobs perspective than green hydrogen." - Catrinus Jepma, New Energy Coalition