Wanted: 42,000 extra apprentices by 2030 for renewable energy transition

An extra 22,000 apprentices should have been on the tools last year to meet the workforce needs of the renewables transition and green manufacturing boom.

Australia has made inroads on its net zero labour shortages, a government-backed independent industry body says, but warns trainee numbers are still off-track.

A failure to keep a healthy pipeline of electricians and other essential occupations progressing through training risks further slowing a clean energy transition already feeling the weight of cumbersome planning processes, community opposition and other roadblocks.

Powering Skills Organisation said 42,000 extra workers would be needed for energy, gas and renewables industries by 2030 in its latest update on workforce dynamics in the industry.

It’s a figure previously at the upper end of estimates but now looking increasingly likely as Australia leans into its green metals and broader clean manufacturing opportunity.

To have enough energy workers by the end of the decade, the Powering Skills Organisation would have liked to have seen 40 per cent more apprentices in training in 2024, representing an increase to 77,000 from 55,000.

Chief executive officer of the organisation, Anthea Middleton, said getting employers to take on apprentices was a perennial issue exacerbated by an eight-fold increase in the value of major energy projects over the past 10 years.

“What is often misunderstood in the system is that everyone wants to hire a trained electrician, but no one wants to train the electrician,” she told AAP.

Training is a costly exercise dominated by small businesses that often do not reap the rewards of an extra pair of hands because their apprentices are snapped up by bigger outfits in their third or fourth years.

Long waits for the in-classroom component of learning and a shortage of trainers are other issues gumming up the pipeline.

The PSO has outlined a number of solutions to training bottlenecks, including a national register for hopefuls seeking apprentice spots and boosting training infrastructure and trainer numbers.

Enforcing early-stage apprentice quotas on major projects, namely large businesses, was billed as a way to incentivise the big end of town to bring on fresh trainees.

Ms Middleton was “urgently optimistic” Australia’s workforce hurdles could be overcome to clear the way for a fast, efficient energy transition but it was important to be ambitious.

“We really do need a collective view from the states and territories and the federal government on things like energy policy, on things like system reform,” she said.

The workforce report will be released at a Parliament House event with federal Skills and Training Minister Andrew Giles on Thursday.

The minister said up to $10,000 in financial support for apprentices and other federal schemes in skills and training were helping.

“We need to continue to work together – governments, industry, unions and other stakeholders – to get more apprentices into Australia’s energy sector,” he said.

Source: AAP