After Hundreds of Thousands Job Losses, Clean Energy Industry Hopes for Recovery

As the pandemic continues to affect large portions of the U.S. economy, one of Ohio’s most starkly impacted industries has been the clean energy sector. According to a recent analysis of federal unemployment filings filed by BW Research, 14% of the clean energy industry’s previous workforce in Ohio was still unemployed at the end of September, totaling almost 500,000 job losses.

With only 12,500 jobs added since last month, the issue of how the clean energy sector will recover from the current economic crisis is on the minds of many industry leaders and workers.

Micaela Preskill, Midwest Advocate for E2 (one of the recipients of the BW Research report) notes that while the goal for the clean energy industry has remained the same — to broaden the market for clean energy and phase out fossil energy — the approach has changed.

E2’s efforts to promote clean energy come in the form of lobbying at the state and federal level, as well and working with other organizations like BW to conduct research on clean energy developments.

Preskill says that the importance of clean energy to Midwest states like Ohio, Michigan, and Illinois is often understated. “I feel like there’s a misconception that the Midwest doesn’t like Clean Energy,” she says. “That’s just not true.”

“The Midwest is actually a place where there are ambitious goals being set,” Preskill says. She notes that one of the most important developments made in the midwest has been in the electric vehicle market, “whether they’re some of the big autos that are going 100% electric vehicle, or new electric vehicle companies that are setting up shop and growing and hiring in the Midwest.” 

One of the most recent examples of this has been Lordstown Motors’ new electric truck, which received significant press coverage in late September after President Trump made remarks congratulating the company on the development of its new vehicle.

Despite the president’s praise of the company, his administration has faced criticism by many in the industry for its approach to clean energy. 
“There’s been consistent attacks by our federal government on the clean energy industry and quite frankly a narrative that’s being pushed out by the federal government that clean energy is a job killer when that is completely inaccurate,” Preskill says.

Ian Adams is Managing Director at Clean Energy Trust, an organization that invests in clean energy innovation projects. He notes that policy barriers have historically been present at all levels of government.

“Over the last decade, costs have really come down for clean energy solutions and there are many solutions like energy efficiency which were already a good value,” Adams says, “but sometimes the policy at the federal or state level did not always incent the adoption of these solutions.”

Adams added that while policy barriers based on cost were historically a major issue, clean energy’s biggest issue now is competition with existing energy solutions like fossil fuels.

While the pandemic has temporarily curtailed growth in this industry, both Preskill and Adams express optimism about the future as Midwest companies move through it, especially for Ohio. “I think that we’re kind of the place to watch, and pretty soon the rest of the country is going to have to catch up to us,” Preskill says as it relates to clean energy efforts in the Midwest.

“The industry was definitely affected,” she says about the pandemic. “We’ve seen job losses as a result. We’ve also seen a lot of those jobs come back as is true with a lot of the economy, but we have not seen the industry fully restored.”

This requires commitment from policymakers, however. “If there’s stimulus related to the pandemic or a future infrastructure investment, that’s an area where there’s a lot of opportunity for clean energy job growth,” Adams says.