WASHINGTON, May 24 (UPI) -- As green business blooms, so will the need for "green-collar" workers, but the question of who should train this workforce remains controversial.
Green is in vogue in the business community right now, and several companies recently announced major monetary commitments to environmentally friendly programs. In May, Citigroup Inc., the world's largest financial-services company, pledged $50 billion over the next decade to eco-friendly projects; two months earlier, Bank of America dedicated $20 billion for the same time period.
As more businesses jump on the green wagon, though, a shortage of environmentally skilled workers has developed.
"There's a huge demand for people trained for environmental skills," said Dan Esty, co-author of "Green to Gold: How Smart Companies Use Environmental Strategy to Innovate, Create Value, and Build Competitive Advantage."
Enrollment in programs like the Yale Environment School, a graduate program, reflects the growing need for green workers, said Esty, director of the Center for Business and Environment at Yale.
"We had a record number of applicants to our program (this year) and our graduates have many more job opportunities," Esty told United Press International.
While these highly educated graduates are primed for corporate jobs, many organizations want the green-job boom open to all workers.
"We believe the green, clean-energy economy can do more than create business opportunities for the rich," Van Jones, president of the California-based Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, told lawmakers at a U.S. House hearing Tuesday. "We also believe that the green economy can create job opportunities for the poor."
In order for the poor to find employment in green industry, they need training, which, in turn, requires government funding, said Jones and other panelists.
"The most important thing that the federal government can do right now on the job side is to make money available to cities to figure out their own strategies," Jones told UPI.
More specifically, $300 billion in federal funds over the next 10 years could create 3 million jobs, estimates the Apollo Alliance, a non-profit organization that pushes clean-energy jobs for low-income workers.
The money would be used for training purposes, as well as "building efficiency, renewable energy investments, smart growth, biofuels development" and other initiatives, said Apollo Alliance President Jerome Ringo.
"You can level the playing field with respect to job training to help those who have been disproportionately hurt by global warming, which has been the poor," Ringo told lawmakers. "Make it easier for the poor to reap the benefits of the new jobs."
Storms and other weather conditions intensified by climate change harm poor communities more than affluent ones, said Ringo, pointing to the largely low-income victims of Hurricane Katrina.
In Los Angeles, a proposed green project could lift decaying inner-city neighborhoods and their residents. After conducting an energy audit of public buildings, the Strategic Concepts in Organizing and Policy Education, a grass-roots organization, wants $100 million dedicated to retrofit 100 city buildings, creating an estimated 2,000 jobs. Energy retrofitting involves upgrading or replacing insulation, lights, heating and cooling systems, windows and other components to increase energy efficiency in the building.
"Greening existing infrastructure such as buildings is a great way to preserve and make more sustainable older urban communities that have been neglected," said Elsa Barboza, SCOPE's campaign coordinator. "Projects that pay a fair wage can also benefit the local community, particularly low-income urban workers."
Training more workers in green jobs may be necessary in order for advancements in alternative-energy technologies to be realized, some experts say.
"(Energy) technologies grow and are deployed in the context of an economy," said Jae Edmonds, laboratory fellow and chief scientist for the Joint Global Change Research Institute. "Jobs are part of the production processes and therefore part of the deployment of those technologies."
Each energy technology includes its own set of specialized jobs. For instance, if the wind industry takes off, so will the need for wind turbine and tower manufacturers and wind farm maintenance workers.
Funding training for these jobs will "create pathways out of poverty," said Rep. Hilda Solis, D-Calif., who plans to propose a Green Jobs Anti-Poverty Investment Act sometime after Memorial Day.
The bill would provide funding for training programs in community colleges, small businesses and grassroots organizations.
"Businesses are already doing this and the biggest complaint is that there isn't a trained workforce," Solis told UPI. "That's what our job should be -- to boost that."
Others disagree.
"I believe the free market forces of the private sector offer the best road to job creation," Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., said at Tuesday's hearing. "I think relying on the government to create jobs is a dead end."
New training programs could also replicate those already in place, Sensenbrenner said.
"Is installing a solar panel fundamentally different than installing a satellite dish?" he asked. "I have serious questions about what type of training will really be needed for so-called 'green collar' jobs."
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