Green Collar Careers

Interested in a green collar career, but worried that you don’t have the experience? There’s a way to start building some expertise in your current position.

Many companies and organizations are becoming concerned about their environmental footprint as more and more attention is paid to climate change. Unfortunately, most of them either don’t know where to start or don’t have the resources to do anything about it.

In my experience working with small and medium sized companies, the best approach is to designate one or more “green team” staff to start doing the research and figuring out where to start. If you want to build some green collar skills, just volunteer to be that person. Whether you are an accountant or a graphic designer, there’s an opportunity to do what us environmental consultants do every day. Tell everyone in your office that you’d be willing to help. Chances are that when the time comes to assign some people, you’ll get the call.

The best place to start is the GHG Protocol, which outlines a comprehensive system for doing a GHG inventory.

This is older, but I just came across it while doing some research for a new project. The Environmental Leader provides a list of the Top 100 cleantech companies (as of September anyways).

There are some familiar names on here, such as Tesla Motors and Solar City. But also some new ones, such as GridPoint, named the overall winner. The list breaks each company into categories, which makes me think I should split up the “cleantech” subject I’ve been using in my sector and subject breakdown.  I was particularly surprised at how many waste management companies are out there. Seems like an underserved area.

Three very cool maps to share that I’ve come across recently:

1. 3tiergroup’s wind power siting tool based on Google maps, which shows average wind speeds globally, and can be adjusted based on the height of the turbine.

2. I’ve pointed out NREL’s excellent collection of renewable energy maps before, but this is a whole new level. The US Atlas of Renewable Resources is a dynamic map that has several energy source layers, including solar, wind, and biomass. The map also provides information on transportation, streets, and elevations. Very cool.

3. The excellent blog Earth2Tech put together a map of 101 cleantech startups in the US. This is a great way to visualize where the development is happening.

This is a couple of weeks old, but still worth noting: The SF Chronicle lays out some interesting interesting news, there aren’t enough qualified people to fill all the green collar jobs in California.

Already, the state lacks enough solar panel installers to keep up with demand, and electrical utilities trying to expand their use of renewable power have a hard time finding qualified workers, said panelists at the Advancing the New Energy Economy summit in San Francisco.

If you’re interested in green collar work, California is the place to be, particularly the Bay Area.

Thanks to Paul for the link.

I’ve been feeling a little overwhelmed at fighting a one man battle over the definition of “green collar”. It’s gotten me a little sidetracked from the main purpose of this blog, actually. But I suppose it’s an interesting academic exercise.

Fortunately, a couple of new sources have come to my rescue.  First, an editor at Merriam Webster. In a Washington Post article from last week, Tom Pitoniak explains his understanding of the term:

“Blue- and white-collar are polarizing terms,” says Pitoniak. “This is different. You’ve sort of got light-green and blue-green-collar jobs. Sure, there’s work where physical labor is involved, but a lot of jobs don’t involve wielding a shovel. You’ve also got scientific and scholarly jobs which are typically considered white-collar. I think the term ‘green-collar’ is very distinct.”

He even uses my “blue-green” buzzword modification!

Next, the new Journal blog Environmental Capital has already tackled this head on, with a post about the popularity of the buzzword in Washington, and a second one today with more on definitions. I’m glad these guys are on the case.

The Wall Street Journal is my favorite newspaper, even for news coverage beyond the markets. That may change now that the Rupert Murdoch empire has taken over and the brilliant reporting staff begins to defect to more upstanding publications.

One positive development is the Journal’s announcement of a new blog focused on business and the environment: Environmental Capital. This will be at the top of my reading list, and I recommend it for anyone with an economics or finance interest. Witness today’s post on how the Fed rate cut will affect renewable energy stocks:

As we saw earlier this month, oil’s tiny flutters heavily affect investor sentiment on renewable-energy stocks. When oil fell below $90 and kept retreating, solar stocks took a beating, supposedly on the theory that cheaper oil reduces demand for clean-energy alternatives. (Cheaper, in this case, being clearly relative.) By that logic, keeping oil north of $90 ought to give fresh legs to solar, wind, and other clean-energy players.

I’ve been frustrated with the lack of broader analysis of renewable energy trends (for example, much of the discussion at popular blog Seeking Alpha seems to be random individuals pumping specific stocks). The context and insight provided by the Journal on more mainstream topics has always impressed me, and I’m looking forward to this green focus.

Sarah writes: “Hi! I was reading your blog and I am definitely interested in a green collar career. Any advice for entry level mechanical engineers?”

Part of me wishes I had majored in engineering in college. There are major opportunities for engineers in the green collar space these days. Two big ones come to mind:

1. Working for a renewable energy developer or a green technology startup. Engineers are in huge demand now in this sector, with all of the funding pouring into new ventures. The expertise in Silicon Valley in recent years has been on the software side, and now a lot of these companies need people with mechanical or electrical skill sets. Plus, this sector is shaping up to be this decade’s tech boom. I haven’t found any job boards that focus on greentech specifically, so you’ll have to research specific companies. Check out Akeena Solar, Borrego Solar, Tioga Energy, as examples. A good way to find lists of companies is through industry associations and networking groups, such as the Renewable Energy Business Network. For news and good insights, check out the Cleantech Blog. Keep in mind that this is potentially a risky career path, as many of these startups will eventually fail. The ones that succeed should do very well though.

2. Working with large engineering/design firms in newly established “sustainability” practice areas. Many types of companies, from the big accounting firms to small, one person consulting shops, are helping companies reduce their environmental footprint and develop climate change and/or environmental strategies. I’ve been most impressed by engineering/architecture firms in this area, because they have the technical background to help with real improvements. Lots of companies are looking for energy auditors and green building specialists. Check out WSP and HDR as examples.

Any mechanical engineers out there want to chime in with more information?

In part 1 I presented a list of potential green collar career subjects. I will now list the sectors I’ve come up with. Again, I see the space in a sort of matrix - with subjects on one axis and sectors on the other. All the overlapping areas are potential business and job opportunities. I will give some examples after the sector list.

Note that this list is by no means exhaustive. I plan to include more sectors and subjects as I run across them. I hope this is useful in terms of thinking about what kinds of green business work you might be interested in. Here they are:
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As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a big fan of maps. I’ve encountered an accelerating number of excellent environmental data visualizations recently. Here are two of the most interesting and useful I’ve seen.

US carbon footprint map. With data and rankings by state, including the best and worst performers. It’s interesting to watch California and Montana switch colors when you move from total carbon output to per capita output, for example.

Oil reserves cartogram (from The Atlantic). Without delving into the politics of the post, I find this map fascinating. It’s one of the best ways I can think of to make the case for renewable energy in North America.

Most of my thinking about green collar careers is based on the assumption that “green collar” work can fit into a huge variety of different types of jobs. Those jobs can be categorized in several ways: by sectors, subjects, and functions (these are my made-up terms). For example, Joe Powers, who I interviewed in November, works in the technology startup sector, in the sales and marketing function, for a company that focuses on electric cars.

I’ve spent some time trying to determine what all of these categories could be, and I’ve come up with what I think are good lists. I don’t think it’s worth laying out the functional categories, because that’s not as interesting. Suffice to say you can have pretty much any role in the green collar space, be it sales, administration, business development, finance, strategy, etc. The more interesting categories are the subjects (e.g. the environmental issues) and sectors (e.g. the businesses).

Think of these lists as overlapping in a matrix. Each box in the matrix presents an opportunity for a job and career path, at least generally. Here is my list of subjects:
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