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NEW YORK, NY — The U.S. Climate Alliance, a bipartisan coalition of 24 governors representing approximately 60 percent of the U.S. economy and 55 percent of the U.S. population, today launched the Governors’ Climate-Ready Workforce Initiative to grow career pathways in climate and clean energy fields, strengthen workforce diversity, and jointly train 1 million new registered apprentices by 2035 across the Alliance’s states and territories.
Today’s announcement was made at a Climate Week NYC event featuring Alliance co-chairs New York Governor Kathy Hochul and New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, founding member Washington Governor Jay Inslee, and White House National Climate Advisor Ali Zaidi.
“In New York, we’re showing how climate action and economic growth go hand-in-hand,” said New York Gov. Kathy Hochul. “As a co-chair of the U.S. Climate Alliance, I’m proud to be collaborating with states, industry leaders, labor unions, higher education and community organizations to create the jobs of the future required to build a clean, equitable, and resilient economy. A skilled and well-prepared workforce will drive innovation, create new businesses, and ensure a sustainable, resilient future for our country.”
“We need a climate-ready workforce — from EV technicians and heat pump installers to solar panel manufacturers — to meet our carbon reduction goals,” said New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham. “The Executive Order I’m issuing today in conjunction with the Alliance’s new Workforce Initiative will help ensure that workers from all backgrounds have access to the skills and training needed for high-quality, climate-ready jobs across New Mexico.”
“We’re aligning our ambitious climate policies with workforce development to have 1 million more workers poised to take these good-paying, union jobs that serve our communities and strengthen our economies,” said Washington Gov. Jay Inslee. “These are economy-wide jobs, not just in clean energy but building trades, land management, clean technology and more. Climate Alliance states have a track record of meeting our ambitious goals and that momentum continues today.”
“Under President Biden and Vice President Harris’s leadership, we are bringing down the barriers to economic opportunity, lowering costs for American families, and catalyzing a renaissance of American-made manufacturing that is creating jobs across America. In fact, just last year, we added over 250,000 new American energy jobs — with clean energy jobs growing twice as fast as the rest of the sector,” said White House National Climate Advisor Ali Zaidi. “Governors across America are at the forefront of our efforts to spur growth in union jobs, expand American energy production, and invest in the economic success of our communities. Today’s announcement will help capitalize on our momentum to create a climate-ready workforce that is rebuilding our nation’s infrastructure, communities, and industrial strength.”
The Initiative’s launch comes as historic federal investments, combined with ambitious state climate action, have unleashed a significant expansion of good-paying and union jobs in climate-ready fields — with millions more anticipated in the coming years under the Biden-Harris administration’s Inflation Reduction Act and Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. This includes high-quality jobs not only in clean energy and clean technology sectors — such as wind, solar, electric vehicles, energy efficiency, and batteries — but also in fields associated with climate resilience and natural climate solutions.
Under this Initiative, Alliance states and territories will collaborate to collectively support 1 million new workers in completing Registered Apprenticeship programs across the coalition by 2035. These programs, registered with the U.S. Department of Labor or federally approved State Apprenticeship Agencies, provide an especially valuable and proven career pathway, empowering workers to earn while they learn in key climate-ready occupations and industries.
Alliance members will also advance a series of collective goals aimed at strengthening and expanding pathways into a wide variety of climate-ready professions critical to building a clean, equitable, and resilient net-zero future. The Initiative’s goals include boosting job quality and ensuring climate-ready employment pathways lead to good-paying, high-quality jobs; expanding opportunities for workers from underrepresented and underserved communities; and promoting the use of stackable and portable credentials in climate-ready fields to build transferable skills, support reskilling and upskilling, and strengthen workers’ economic mobility. A full list of the Initiative’s goals can be found here.
Finally, to advance sector-specific strategies, Alliance members will work together through new multi-state cohorts focused on in-demand, climate-ready fields. These cohorts will provide a platform for states and territories to increase collaboration, share evidence-based practices, engage experts and stakeholders, and develop sectoral workforce solutions that can be scaled across the country. Cohorts to be launched in the Initiative’s first year will focus on careers in the following areas:
The Initiative will be led by Alliance states and territories with support from the Alliance’s Secretariat. In implementing the Initiative, Alliance members will customize efforts to meet their individual needs and challenges, while working together to achieve the collective goals. States and territories will also collaborate directly with their workforce development system partners, labor unions, higher education institutions, industry, and other key partners that bring substantial expertise and experience in this work.
This Initiative builds on a number of federal-state collaborations between the Alliance’s members and the Biden-Harris Administration, including a White House convening with Alliance governors’ offices in May focused on creating good-paying jobs and mobilizing a diverse workforce in climate and clean energy.
Additional information on the Governors’ Climate-Ready Workforce Initiative can be found here.
Support for the Governors’ Climate-Ready Workforce Initiative:
North America’s Building Trades Unions (NABTU) President Sean McGarvey: “NABTU is proud to support the U.S. Climate Alliance’s Climate-Ready Workforce Initiative, which will create career pathways in clean energy and climate resilience while elevating job quality and workforce diversity. With a goal of training 1 million new apprentices by 2035, this initiative will play a critical role in bolstering the infrastructure generation by expanding gold standard, earn-as-you-learn apprenticeship programs that prepare workers for careers in construction fields. By prioritizing good-paying union jobs, middle class-sustaining wages, and worker safety, this initiative ensures the clean energy transition is both just and equitable. NABTU looks forward to working alongside the U.S. Climate Alliance to build a diverse and skilled workforce, ensuring green jobs are good jobs.”
BlueGreen Alliance Executive Director Jason Walsh: “We’re excited to see governors stepping up to make sure we have the workforce needed to fill the good jobs that are being created by the Inflation Reduction Act, Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, and CHIPS and Science Act. There is a tremendous opportunity from those federal investments to rebuild our blue-collar middle class by creating pathways into skilled, long-term careers in sectors like construction and manufacturing. This commitment from governors across the country is good for workers, good for employers, and good for the high-road clean energy economy we’re building together.”
Ceres Vice President of Government Relations Anne Kelly: “As clean energy investment surges across the U.S., it is both a major challenge and a top priority for companies to find the qualified, skilled, and diverse workers they need to build and deploy clean energy infrastructure. State governments can better position themselves to attract more investment and meet their decarbonization goals by working to solve this issue with innovative strategies that grow and train the clean energy workforce. Ceres and the companies we work with celebrate today’s announcement of the Governors’ Climate-Ready Workforce Initiative, a timely and bipartisan effort that will play an outsized role in building a clean, reliable, and affordable energy system.”
National Skills Coalition Managing Director of State Strategies Melissa Johnson: “State governments have a crucial role to play in leveraging historic federal investments to create unprecedented jobs and training opportunities for the workforce while fighting climate change. It is incredible that this coalition of governors is stepping up to prioritize the diversity and economic security of the climate workforce because our climate readiness hinges on a new generation of workers having access to the education, skills training, and economic supports they need to access good jobs and careers in this booming sector.”
Business Leaders United for Workforce Partnerships Director Jeffrey Connor-Naylor: “Federal investments in infrastructure and clean energy have positioned start-ups and small and mid-sized businesses for tremendous growth, but they need a diverse and multigenerational skilled workforce to expand. Companies in these sectors are eager to build apprenticeship and skills training programs to support their growth, and they want to hire workers in their communities. However, many are unsure where to start, and this initiative will provide a framework to help them move forward.”
Center for American Progress Senior Fellow Mike Williams: “A successful clean energy future requires investing in working people today. The Governors’ Climate Ready Workforce Initiative is a critical step to ensuring that the people powering the future clean economy are ready and able to fill high quality jobs. By collaborating with unions and expanding registered apprenticeships, this initiative will build off the success of the Biden-Harris administration’s efforts, notably including the Inflation Reduction Act, that have shown that fighting the climate crisis will mean the creation of good, union jobs.”
Launched on June 1, 2017 by the governors of Washington, New York, and California to help fill the void left by the previous administration’s decision to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Agreement, the Alliance has grown to include 24 governors from across the U.S. representing approximately 60% of the U.S. economy and 55% of the U.S. population. Governors in the Alliance have pledged to collectively reduce net greenhouse gas emissions by at least 26-28% by 2025, 50-52% by 2030, and 61-66% by 2035, all below 2005 levels, and collectively achieve overall net-zero greenhouse gas emissions as soon as practicable, and no later than 2050.
The Alliance’s states and territories continue to demonstrate that climate action goes hand-in-hand with economic growth, job creation, and better public health. The Alliance reduced its collective net greenhouse gas emissions by 19% between 2005 and 2022, while increasing collective GDP by 30%, and is on track to meet its near-term climate goal by reducing collective GHG emissions 26% below 2005 levels by 2025. The coalition’s states and territories are employing more workers in the clean energy sector, achieving lower levels of dangerous air pollutants, and preparing more effectively for climate impacts and executing more pre-disaster planning than the rest of the country.
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