Photo by Anastasia Palagutina on Unsplash
Getting any good-paying white-collar job in the United States usually requires people to spend at least four years obtaining a college degree. However, in the green energy sector, the situation has been different. Jobs in the solar and wind energy sectors only require people to attend a 2-year renewable energy training program.
This sector has had the fastest-rising job-creation rate since 2018. In the last eight months since President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act, the industry has employed more than 100,000 workers. Michael Gengler, a wind professor at Iowa Lakes Community College in Estherville, Iowa, told USA TODAY he receives emails weekly from green energy companies asking to hire his students. His experience is similar to that of several other solar and wind college professors in the U.S., including Michael “Kit” Thompson, director of the renewables program at Cloud County Community College in Concordia. Experts expect jobs in the green energy sector to reach 9 million by 2030.
