Congressional Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Policy Forum (EXPO 2022): The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Buildings and Workforce

The Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI) and the House and Senate Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency (REEE) Caucuses held the 25th Annual Congressional Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Policy Forum (EXPO 2022) on July 25, 2022. In the second panel, panelists discussed how the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law will help make the building sector more sustainable and resilient. They also discussed the need to invest in workforce development and worker training for a 21st century energy system.

• Paula Glover, President, Alliance to Save Energy (ASE)
• Jason Walsh, Executive Director, BlueGreen Alliance (BGA)
• Curt Rich, President and CEO, North American Insulation Manufacturers Association (NAIMA)
• Jeannie Salo, Vice President of Government Relations, North America, Schneider Electric; Board Member, Business Council for Sustainable Energy (BCSE)

Highlights

Paula Glover, President, Alliance to Save Energy (ASE)

• The energy sector has 7.8 million jobs in the United States, 2.2 million of which are energy efficiency jobs (the largest share in this sector), according to the U.S. Energy and Employment Jobs Report.
• Energy efficiency employment includes not just energy audits, but also manufacturers of HVAC systems, manufacturers of lighting systems, building managers, insulation developers, and technology experts.
• Energy efficiency opportunities must be available and affordable to households and small businesses.
• Energy efficiency jobs exist in 99.6 percent of counties in the United States, indicating great opportunities for small business growth and development.
• Local energy efficiency jobs are key to a just energy transition.

Jason Walsh, Executive Director, BlueGreen Alliance (BGA)

• The clean energy and energy efficiency economy is inherently a more labor-intensive economy than an economy that is based on fossil fuels and waste.
• In the power sector, the industry creates more jobs by manufacturing and installing sources of energy, rather than burning them.
• In the building sector, energy efficiency turns wasted energy into employment opportunities.
• The BlueGreen Alliance (BGA) is focused on job quality, access, and where jobs are created.
• While the clean energy economy has become a significant part of the economy over the past decade, not enough of the jobs that have been created to date are high-quality, family-supporting jobs.
• A number of the signifier occupations across clean energy sectors do not pay as much on average compared to similar occupations in incumbent energy sectors.
• Union density rates are lower in clean energy overall, though they are increasing.
• To date, many clean energy jobs have not been created in the communities that need them most; BGA is focused on deindustrialized communities, energy transition communities, and Justice40 communities.
• From a policy standpoint, this is an issue of equity and fairness. From a political economy standpoint, unions will only support a clean energy transition if their members are getting enough work in the clean energy economy compared to the fossil-based economy.
• If communities or entire regions are left behind, they will also resist the energy transition that the country is already experiencing.
• Public policy should be based on the principle that if projects are using taxpayer dollars, there should be the broadest public benefit from those investments.

Curt Rich, President and CEO, North American Insulation Manufacturers Association (NAIMA)

• Addressing the climate emergency begins by focusing on the building sector and undertaking actions that decarbonize buildings.
• New buildings should be highly efficient and in accordance with the current model energy code.
• There are two levers to decarbonize existing buildings:
  • Convince the building owner that upgrading their building is worthwhile and that they will recoup their initial investment in a short period and then continue to enjoy savings.
  • Use utility and government incentives to defray the cost of these investments or operate in tandem.
• The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) (P.L. 117-58) will provide money for residential, commercial, and industrial building efficiency programs.
• In a study commissioned by the insulation industry, the emission reduction opportunities from implementing easily achievable insulation upgrade measures were found to be equivalent to all wind power generation in the country, a third of all natural gas-fired generation, or the energy use of a quarter of the existing homes in the country.

Jeannie Salo, Vice President of Government Relations North America, Schneider Electric, Board Member, Business Council for Sustainable Energy (BCSE)

• The clean energy industry is hiring faster than the overall national economy and is paying above-average wages, according to Forbes.
• States with strong climate policies are also seeing strong job growth; for example, Michigan added 35,500 new energy jobs in 2021 after establishing an economy-wide net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 goal in 2020.
• The future of U.S. infrastructure must be about the future workforce.
• Electricians, for example, are retiring at a faster rate than new electricians are being trained. Older electricians also want to take jobs they understand and are comfortable with, which may not include retrofitting a building.
• Recruiting, retraining, and developing the labor of the future is the only way the United States can stay competitive.
• Digitization is at the core of becoming more efficient and transforming our infrastructure; the industrial Internet of Things is also crucial to manufacturing.
• A key example is Schneider Electric’s smart factory in Lexington, Kentucky, which highlights the possibility of embracing digitization and industrial Internet of Things technologies and of providing increased plant processes efficiency and good-paying jobs.
• It is imperative that the industry and government partner to ensure the availability of a digital workforce capable of meeting rising demands and hiring.
• Despite the bipartisan infrastructure law’s workforce growth provisions, the industry is still facing challenging labor shortages.
• Schneider Electric is launching two key workforce programs:
  • The “returnship” program is a 6-month training program targeting those who left the workforce and are looking to return.
  • The bridge program is an apprenticeship program that connects experienced professionals with nontraditional backgrounds with new energy careers.

Q&A

Q: Looking ahead to the implementation of IIJA, where do you see the biggest potential impacts in terms of job growth?

Glover:

• A lot of the investments from IIJA, like weatherization and money for schools, will help create economic opportunities.
• What is important about this legislation is not just the money that is being spent on energy efficiency measures across the country, but also that there is money being invested in job training.

Walsh:

• For BlueGreen Alliance, it is not just about job creation, it is also about job quality and access.
• While there are some good labor standards around prevailing wage and domestic content, the Biden-Harris Administration and federal agencies need to be creative and flexible in terms of the incentives they create.
• For example, applicants could be encouraged to use project labor agreements and community workforce agreements. Applicants could also be rewarded for projects that create a talent pipeline based in the community.
• The best-developed model for this is the apprenticeship readiness program to registered apprenticeship program pathway.
• It is important to leverage private-sector dollars. One way to do that is by leveraging the private dollars of registered apprenticeship programs (building trade unions and their employer association partners run 1,600 training centers nationwide, investing $1.6 billion per year).

Rich:

• $250 million has been allocated to building energy code adoption and implementation at the state and city levels.
• This is a major increase from the $5 to $10 million in funding for the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Building Energy Codes program.
• Training the workforce to enforce updated codes is going to catalyze energy-efficient construction and support all of the other initiatives that are underway across building sectors to drive energy efficiency.

Salo:

• The future need for electricity, such as electric vehicle charging station networks and homes turning into virtual power plants, is going to fundamentally change the country’s energy landscape.
• Every state and local official who applies for a grant for a clean port or a net-zero airport, for example, should also talk to the local university or companies involved about what kind of job training program can go along with that project.

Q: What does the clean energy workforce of 2030 need to look like if the United States is going to meet the climate goals of the Biden-Harris Administration or of the states that are setting their own targets?

Walsh:

• A younger, more diverse, and more representative workforce is essential.
• While there are going to be new skills involved and new occupations, for the most part, these are existing skills and existing occupations.

• Due to the urgency of the climate crisis, having verifiable, credentialed skills for the workers that are doing the work is going to be fundamental.
• For example, the difference between a properly installed and maintained HVAC system and one that is improperly installed and maintained is tons of emissions.
• Reaching these goals will require an effective Congress that can make investments and pass ambitious policies that meet the moment.
• The House-passed Build Back Better Act (H.R.5376) was enormously targeted in terms of investments made in energy transition communities.

Rich:

• The building trades are heavily reliant on migrant labor, so as long as our immigration laws are broken, that is going to put inordinate stress on that workforce.
• If there is a strong market demand for efficiency-related products and services, those industries will find the workforce.

Salo:

• Everything and everybody needs to be smarter to maximize efficiency.
• For example, bringing software and real-time data analytics to buildings can enable individuals and companies to maximize efficiencies by leveraging the power of artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things

Glover:

• The energy workforce of 2030 needs to look like the demographics of the United States.
• The DOE’s U.S. Energy and Employment Jobs Report tells us that in 2021, 74 percent of the energy workforce was white and male. Furthermore, since many survey takers did not know the ethnicity of the people who work for them, the report does not include good data to tell us the demographics of nonwhite workers.
• If the industry does not hire more women, Black, and brown people, it will not be a sustainable business. The demographics of the students coming through the education system are women, Black, and brown people.

Compiled by Abi Shiva and edited for clarity and length. This is not a transcript.