Green skills shortage complicates Europe’s transition to sustainable heating – report
Clean Energy Wire / Tagesspiegel Background
A green skills shortage in Europe’s construction sector complicates the planned transition to sustainable heating, and risks jeopardising decarbonisation and climate targets, according to a report commissioned by the business and philanthropy organisation Laudes Foundation, which was seen by Tagesspiegel Background. The analysis of working conditions in the construction sector in ten European countries found that a serious skilled labour shortage is looming.
“The construction industry needs four million workers by 2035 for Europe to achieve its green transition targets,” said Paola Cammilli, head of global campaigns at the international workers’ organisation BWI. “Hardly anyone is talking about this – and the conditions under which workers are already labouring explain why. Construction workers are already on the front line of the climate crisis.”
The four million-figure also includes job vacancies that open up when workers retire. The report estimated that Europe's energy transition could create approximately 312,000 new jobs in Europe’s construction sector, a one-percent increase in existing jobs. The figure could be even higher depending on total investments in modernisation and new construction, the authors added.
The growing shortage of skilled workers in the construction sector also applies to Germany individually, the report said. An ageing population is putting significant pressure on the sector, in which precarious working conditions and physically demanding tasks are common. This is leading to widespread early retirement, further exacerbating the existing labour shortage.
The report estimated that the German construction sector will need around 767,000 workers by 2035 for climate-related construction projects alone. Of these, nearly 60 percent would have to consist of skilled workers, it added.
Germany’s government is preparing a Building Renovation Plan which has to be finalised before the end of this year. Comments made by stakeholders during the consultation stage of a current draft suggested that the construction industry has recognised the green skills shortage, Tagesspiegel Background said. The draft says the country currently is already facing a shortage of about 90,000 workers in the energy and construction sector.
The building sector poses one of Germany’s greatest hurdles for becoming climate neutral. Buildings are responsible for 16 percent of total greenhouse gas emissions (only direct emissions; the given percentage excludes emissions from electricity use, district heating, industrial buildings).