Green skills

Solar panel being fittedWe urgently need to shift towards a low carbon economy – but do we have the skills to do so? We commisioned the Centre for Local Economic Strategies (CLES) to pose the question to three important economic sectors.

Some key findings include:

  • The skills agenda has failed to make concrete connections with the development of a low carbon economy.
  • There are significant skills gaps within the architecture and construction sectors – at the high level end but there are also implications for low level construction skills;
  • The construction sector views a low carbon economy as providing more challenges than opportunities;
  • Our research has found that addressing skills shortages is a decidedly low priority for the construction sector at the current time;
  • The shift to a low carbon economy will require a number of new skills to be developed within the public sector;
  • A number of local authorities appear to be actively engaged with the low carbon agenda – but this is not yet widespread;
  • There are many barriers that may be preventing the public sector from improving its skills base, ranging from recruitment and workforce planning issues to the overarching challenge of the recession.
  • In the science sector, respondents felt the main skills gaps will be in middle management areas, where there is currently a lack of capacity to develop the opportunities within the low carbon economy.

To read the full report, click here.