Green education, training and employment

DOI: https://doi.org/10.58248/HS113

Overview

The European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training (CEDEFOP) defines green skills as “the knowledge, abilities, values and attitudes needed to live in, develop and support a society which reduces the impact of human activity on the environment”.[1]

Contributors to the horizon scan identified several issues related to green skills, education and employment in the UK, particularly in relation to addressing workforce shortages and reaching net zero targets.

In 2024, POST published Green skills for education and employment, POSTnote 711. This peer-reviewed briefing included evidence summaries of broad and sector-specific issues of parliamentary interest, informed by consultation with stakeholders across multiple sectors.

As this briefing is recent, POST has not drafted a horizon scan article for this topic. Instead, the main issues raised in the horizon scan are briefly summarised below. Contributors raised a range of challenges and opportunities, including:

• Workforce transition and skills gaps: Including upskilling people in industries with decreased demand (‘sunset jobs’) due to net-zero targets, for example in the fossil fuel sector. Areas that are losing sunset jobs may not align with where green jobs are being created.[2] For example, oil and gas jobs will be phased down along the east coast of the UK, while most green jobs are being created in London and the Southeast.[3][4] A just transition approach may help to avoid creating or exacerbating inequalities.[5][6]
• Housing/planning skills: Contributors highlighted that the net zero transition requires new housing designs, large-scale retrofitting, new skills, and green finance models, with a focus on preventing inequality.[7][8] The construction workforce is shrinking, which researchers attribute to an ageing workforce, and reduced overseas labour due to Brexit, visa changes and the pandemic.[9][10][11] The construction industry includes a high proportion of sole traders and small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), who may be less motivated or less able to access training.[12][13] Contributors also suggested that planning is slow, under-funded, and lacks digital transformation.[14] They suggested that efficient housing conversions need streamlined approval processes, standardized codes, and skilled workers.
• Skills for renewable energy integration and deployment: providing training on a broad range of innovation skills from materials to systems to PhD level scientists and engineers.[15][16]
• Systems thinking: As well as sector-specific technical skills, several contributors highlighted the need for skills in problem-solving and systems thinking to support behaviour change and develop strategic business and managerial approaches to reach net-zero.[17][18] For example, systems mapping may be used to identify the structural causes of environmental policy challenges,[19][20] such as mapping the stakeholders, activities and interactions between them in a catchment that affect the freshwater and marine environment.[21][22]
• Motivations for industries: Contributors highlighted that for some industries (such as oil and gas), statutory targets may pose a financial and existential threat for the companies themselves, which could delay progress in green skills training for the transition.[23]
• Understanding what works to develop green skills. Research suggests experiential learning approaches result in more effective outcomes than traditional education approaches.[24][25]
• Integrating education pathways with employer goals. Local Skills Improvement Plans (LSIPs), developed by local authorities in partnership with further education colleges, identify local skills gaps and strategies to fill these.[26] Stakeholders suggest that capacity building in local authorities could help align local action with national targets.[27] Contributors also suggested schools career guidance to encourage young people to enter careers that contribute to the net zero transition.[28][29][30]
• Embedding climate change and sustainability in the curriculum: As well as knowledge of the challenges and opportunities, contributors suggested there is a need for critical thinking and analysis skills to inform decision making about sustainability in a changing world.[31][32]
• Ensuring sustainability is embedded across the higher education landscape. Contributors also suggested universities required support to be exemplars of net zero best practice, including acting as early adopters and incubators of technologies, but many have complicated estates of residential, teaching and research facilities.
• Improving population energy literacy to enhance energy conservation actions. Research suggests despite positive attitudes to energy conservation, poor knowledge about energy saving often leads to ineffective energy saving behaviours.[33][34] Contributors suggest better knowledge of simple energy concepts through energy education, such as what a kilowatt hour is, would help household energy choices, such as whether to install a heat pump.[35]
• The role of sustainability volunteering: Researchers highlighted that the scale of volunteering in the UK has been estimated as approaching 15 per cent of GDP, with a growing sustainability focus that incorporates eco-leisure.[36][37][38][39] Policy measures that improve the skills and education of sustainability volunteers could contribute to the UK meeting its net zero commitments.

Many of these issues are also covered in depth in other parliamentary briefing papers, including:

Green skills for education and employment, POSTnote 711

House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee, Green Jobs, Third Report of Session 2021–22

House of Commons Energy Security and Net Zero Committee, Retrofitting homes for net zero

References

[1] CEDEFOP (2010). Skills for green jobs: European synthesis report. 20. CEDEFOP.

[2] Alvis, S. et al. (2022). Closing the UK’s green skills gap. Green Alliance.

[3] PwC (2023). Green Jobs Barometer. PwC

[4] TUC (2020). Cutting carbon, growing skills – green skills for a just transition | Unionlearn. Trades Union Congress.

[5] Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (2023). What is a just transition for environmental targets? UK Parliament.

[6] Sudmant, A. et al. (2021). Tracking local employment in the green economy: The PCAN Just Transition Jobs Tracker. The Place-based Climate Action Network.

[7] House of Lords Built Environment Committee, Meeting housing demand, 1st Report of Session 2021–22

[8] Gibbs, H. (2024). Tackling health and housing inequalities with climate change. Future of London

[9] Green Alliance. (2022). Closing the UK’s green skills gap

[10] CITB. (2021). Migration in the UK construction and built environment sector

[11] BCIS (2024). Will the government’s skills shortages plan make a difference to the construction industry?

[12] Valliant. (2023). Vaillant installer survey report Aspiring to a green future April 2023

[13] Lord Knight et al. (2023). Fit for the future: A 5-point plan to grow and sustain engineering and technology apprenticeships for young people. EngineeringUK

[14] Lang, R. (2024). Low-carbon Homes: Housing construction for the green transition. Future Observatory

[15] Northumbria University Newcastle. Renewable Energy Northeast Universities

[16] F6S. Biointeco

[17] UK Government (2023). Introduction to systems thinking for civil servants. GOV.UK.

[18] Oliver, T. H. et al. (2021). Knowledge architecture for the wise governance of sustainability transitions. Environ. Sci. Policy, Vol 126, 152–163.

[19] Policy Lab (2022). Tools for climate policy: 2) systems mapping. GOV UK

[20] Barbrook-Johnson, P. (2021). Participatory systems mapping for complex energy policy evaluation. Evaluation, Volume 27, Issue 1

[21] Environment Agency (2021). Systems water management for catchment scale processes:  Development and demonstration of a systems analysis framework. Chief Scientist’s Group report

[22] IWRM Action Hub. Source-to-Sea Management. Tool – C1.10

[23] Carr-Whitworth, R., Barrett, J., Colechin, M., Pidgeon, N., Styles, R., Betts-Davies, S., Cox, E., Watson, A. and Wilson, O., 2023. Delivering net zero in the UK: twelve conditions for success. Environmental Research Letters, 18, 7.

[24] Burch, G. et al. (2019). A Meta-Analysis of the Relationship Between Experiential Learning and Learning Outcomes. Decision Sciences, Volume 17, Issue 3, Pages 239-273

[25] van Valkengoed, A. et al. (2019). Meta-analyses of factors motivating climate change adaptation behaviour. Nature Climate Change volume 9, pages 158–163

[26] Department for Education (2022). Local skills improvement plans – statutory guidance. UK Government.

[27] Christie, I. et al. (2023). On multilevel climate governance in an urban/rural county: A case study of Surrey. The Place-based Climate Action Network.

[28] Reay, D. (2023). Skills and Net Zero. Climate Change Committee.

[29] Green Jobs Taskforce (2021). Green Jobs Taskforce report. GOV.UK.

[30] Department for Education (2022). Sustainability and climate change: a strategy for the education and children’s services systems. UK Government.

[31] DfE. (2023). Sustainability and climate change: a strategy for the education and children’s services systems. GOV UK

[32] Catallo, A. et al. (2022). Curriculum for a Changing Climate:  a track changes review of the national curriculum for England Final Report

[33] Cotton, D. et al. (2015). Developing students’ energy literacy in higher education. International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, Vol. 16 No. 4, pp. 456-473

[34] Cotton, D. et al. (2021). Reducing energy demand in China and the United Kingdom: The importance of energy literacy. Journal of Cleaner Production, Volume 278, 123876

[35] The Carbon Literacy Project

[36] Dempsey-Brench, K., & Shantz, A. (2022). Skills-based volunteering: A systematic literature review of the intersection of skills and employee volunteering. Human Resource Management Review, 32(4), 100874.

[37] Kilmartin, M. P. (2021). Understanding the Motivations, Perceived Benefits and Needs of Long-Term Volunteers on Environmental Projects. In Environmental Sustainability Education for a Changing World (pp. 79-95). Cham: Springer International Publishing.

[38] Leyshon, M., Leyshon, C., Walker, T., & Fish, R. (2021). More than sweat equity: Young people as volunteers in conservation work. Journal of Rural Studies, 81, 78-88.

[39] Marafa, L. M. (2018). Leisure in nature: the advent of eco-leisure in academic discourse. World Leisure Journal, 60(3), 178-180.

Photo by: EE Image Database, via Flickr