Net Zero will be Lost or Won on a Skills Shortage Nobody’s Talking About

Across the country, clean energy projects are falling behind schedule. Sometimes it’s planning disputes. Other times, it’s budget pressures. But the challenge that often goes unspoken is that we don’t have the people who make projects move. Not just engineers and technicians, but data analysts, project managers, compliance officers, and procurement specialists.

Our ambition is outpacing our ability to deliver. Energy Secretary Ed Miliband has vowed to go “faster and deeper” on clean energy. While it’s the right sentiment, it assumes we already have a green workforce ready to deliver these plans. But we don’t. The green workforce gap is wider and more nuanced than most realise – and until we close it, we’ll fall short of our 2030 clean power target.

We need a workforce capable of delivering that transformation, which means enabling people with delivery-critical skills to transition into the clean energy industry. Although the government has set out measures to build that green workforce in its Clean Energy Jobs Plan, its strategy focuses on two key groups: young people still in school and workers in adjacent industries such as oil and gas.

We’re overlooking people with directly applicable skills

I think we could be missing a trick. We’re overlooking people with directly applicable skills. I’m talking about mid-career workers – the data analysts with 20 years’ experience in finance or compliance officers in pharmaceuticals. And what about the young professionals at the first rung of their careers or recent university graduates, both of whom have the right skills but have never considered that a green career could be for them?

With 2030 just four years away, we need to broaden the skills ecosystem as much as we can. It’s something we’ve been focused on at Dowds, with the launch of a training and development programme that includes apprenticeships, placements, and opportunities for continuous professional growth.

We need to create these opportunities nationwide, and they need to be open to anyone with relevant skills at any stage of their career. I think the best way to do this is for employers and FE institutions to build it together. To collaborate on practical pathways that create credible routes into green delivery roles, informed by the current and future needs of the clean energy industry.

Rethinking “Green jobs”

Encouraging people with applicable skills to move into the clean energy industry starts with how we talk about “green jobs”. When we think about clean energy, we think about technical roles. Our minds drift to hard hats and people building wind turbines, and while those are absolutely core components of the energy transition, they’re not the only critical careers we need to hire for.

Every major clean energy project relies on these “less obvious” non-technical roles. Having worked in industries such as construction, nuclear, aerospace, and marine, I’ve seen that project delays are rarely due to a lack of technical expertise. It’s operational capacity. These are the people who keep delivery moving. Without them, costs spiral, standards slip, and deadlines are missed.

While government strategy, such as the Clean Energy Jobs Plan, recognises the need for people with non-technical skills to join the workforce, that’s not reflected in public messaging. The rhetoric around green jobs still defaults to technical roles, and it’s holding back recruitment.

Visibility is half the battle. If you can see it, you can be it. But right now, the logistics specialists and the data science student don’t see themselves in the net-zero story. And if they can’t see themselves there, they won’t consider a career in the green workforce.

Addressing this bias is the first and simplest step towards tackling the green skills gap. By broadening the messaging to include roles that aren’t directly related to clean energy, you introduce people to what is possible. Suddenly, a green career seems plausible.

Addressing the challenge

Fixing the messaging problem opens the door – but it won’t encourage people to walk through it. Whether you’re an entry-level worker still exploring your options or a mid-career professional looking to apply existing skills in a new sector, the pathway into clean energy needs to be clear, credible, and genuinely accessible.

I think the best way to do this would be through a structured government scheme, co-designed and delivered through FE institutions, that creates a clear, de-risked route into green delivery roles. Not a vague skills fund, but a practical pathway.

FE colleges strike me as the natural home for this sort of programme. They’re vocational by design, distributed throughout the UK, and already built to serve working adults, providing the flexibility that mid-career and young professionals need.

Government has a role in backing this, but the credibility of these pathways has to come from industry, and that requires real involvement from employers. Unless clean energy firms actively co-design courses with colleges and commit to guaranteed interviews for course completers, skills gaps will go unaddressed, and people won’t feel supported in making the transition.

From my own experience hiring into these roles, I know the financial barriers are real. For mid-career workers, short-term financial support during the transition period could be the deciding factor in whether they take the leap into a new role. And for young people facing one of the toughest job markets in years (The Guardian), a train-and-hire model – where employers commit to taking on a candidate before training is complete – offers a level of security that other sectors can’t provide right now (DSIT).

Our clean energy target is just four years away, and it won’t be achieved by hiring and training any single demographic. We need people from all corners of society: the experienced oil and gas workers, the school leavers, the young professionals, and the mid-career workers with directly applicable skills. The green workforce will be built through apprenticeships and academies, bringing young people in alongside structured pathways that help experienced professionals apply what they already know. Employers and FE institutions working together, and with the right backing, can make both happen.

By Louise McClelland, CEO of the Dowds Group