Workforce Recommendations in the Climate Crisis Report

On June 30, the House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis released its staff report, Solving the Climate Crisis: The Congressional Action Plan for a Clean Energy Economy and a Healthy, Resilient, and Just America. The report is informed by over a year and a half of public engagement and research, including 17 hearings on a wide variety of climate change issues with hundreds of suggestions from stakeholders—such as EESI—and the public. This article is part of a series highlighting key policy suggestions from the Select Committee.

The report recommends a target for the United States to reach net-zero emissions by 2050 through energy efficiency, clean energy, infrastructure, nature-based solutions, and more. To implement the staff’s Climate Action Plan, the report includes a number of recommendations for transforming and mobilizing the nation’s workforce for a decarbonized future.

Clean Energy Workforce

The staff report’s vision of widespread infrastructure updates and clean technology deployment requires a trained workforce to implement. The report frames decarbonization as “a unique opportunity to build a new, clean energy economy on a foundation of equity and fairness for workers and their communities.” Amid the high levels of unemployment created by the COVID-19 crisis, climate mitigation and adaptation are sectors that could help the workforce recover while making the nation more sustainable.

Specifically, the report recommends expanding the Registered Apprenticeship model for clean energy and promoting clean energy training and retraining for workers at all stages of their careers. Such training programs should be inclusive and accessible to underserved communities, as recommended by previously introduced legislation such as Representative Bobby Rush’s (D-Ill.) Blue Collar to Green Collar Jobs Development Act of 2019 (H.R.4148). EESI’s recommendations to the Select Committee similarly highlighted the job creation opportunities provided by clean energy, noting that about 900,000 Americans were employed in the industry directly or indirectly in 2018 alone.

The widespread deployment of clean energy infrastructure, electric vehicles, and other green technologies requires substantial manufacturing capacity, and the report recommends using this opportunity to revitalize domestic industry. To do this, the report recommends authorizing funding for the advanced energy tax credit (section 48C of the Internal Revenue Code), reauthorize and expand the technology production tax credit (section 45M), and authorize grant programs to create new manufacturing facilities or to retool existing ones to meet demand for zero-emissions technologies.

Conservation and Resilience Workforce

Since climate change is already affecting communities and ecosystems, the report recommends a variety of adaptation, resilience, and conservation projects. To carry out these projects, the report recommends reestablishing the New Deal-era Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and establishing the Climate Resilience Service Corps (CRSC). The CCC would employ young Americans in forest planting and restoration, regenerative agriculture, and ecosystem restoration. CRSC members would carry out projects to “improve community adaptation, mitigation, preparedness, response, and recovery from disasters and other climate-driven threats.” The staff report mentions that legislation to create both of these programs has been introduced in the 116th Congress: the 21st Century Conservation Corps Act (H.R.2358) by Representative Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio), the 21st Century Conservation Corps for Our Health and Our Jobs Act (H.R.7264) by Representative Joe Neguse (D-Colo.) and the Climate Resiliency Service Corps Act of 2019 (H.R.5176) by Representative Judy Chu (D-Calif.)

Both Corps programs have precedent in both historic and existing programs. The CCC was a New Deal program active during the Great Depression through the end of the Second World War, and the AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps currently provides opportunities for young people to participate in conservation projects. The Resilience AmeriCorps program is identified in the staff report as an existing program with similar goals to the CRSC. This program began in 2016 and partners with cities and tribal communities to build resilience to climate impacts like flooding, unreliable food access, and extreme heat.

Labor Protections

Climate mitigation and adaptation require attention to workers’ well-being, and the report includes several recommendations to ensure that new and existing jobs provide workers with a high quality of life. For federally-funded construction and infrastructure programs, the report recommends passing strong labor standards that promote safe working conditions, living wages, the right for unions to organize, and signing community benefit agreements. It also acknowledges the danger climate change poses for vulnerable workers, and recommends directing the Secretary of Labor to establish safety standards to limit construction and farm workers’ exposure to extreme heat.

Communities and Workers in Transition

As the staff report encourages a move away from a fossil fuel-driven economy, it suggests a number of ways Congress can support communities and workers most affected by the transition. Clean energy jobs are not always created in places where coal jobs are lost, and do not always require overlapping skillsets. To ease the transition, the report recommends establishing a National Economic Transition Office to direct federal economic and workforce development assistance.

The suite of “community-driven and place-based solutions” recommended to fall under the supervision of the Office include worker support through wage replacement, health care support, retirement fund/pension plan contributions, paid retraining opportunities, and job placement assistance. It would also provide personal support for workers through counseling, financial planning, and housing aid. Finally, the report recommends strengthening communities in transition by investing in local leaders and small business owners, supplementing tax revenue for critical services, and providing grant programs for economic diversification.

 

Responding to climate change will require shifts in how our communities are powered, how we move and build, and how we work with the natural world. All of these shifts provide opportunities for hundreds of thousands of Americans to contribute, and find green solutions in a period of high unemployment.

 

Author: Abby Neal