Today’s clean energy industry is booming, with 9 million green economy jobs and $2 trillion in federal spending anticipated over the next decade. It’s a trend that’s expected to continue as the clean energy sector begins to feel the full impact from historic investments passed in the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

Yet despite this sector’s enormous opportunities and the fact that clean energy now employs over 40% of all energy workers in America, building and accessing strong talent pipelines has been incredibly difficult—both for job seekers and employers.

For job seekers, navigating career pathways to the clean energy industry is the big challenge. They need help overcoming rapidly evolving skill and knowledge gaps, as well as access to training programs that are aligned with industry needs. 

On the recruiting side, employers and government agencies struggle to build robust pipelines of talent due to disjointed nomenclature in the industry, a lack of necessary skills and knowledge, and limited exposure to opportunities. They need help with training and education for job seekers and intentional outreach to develop a more diverse candidate pool.

Julius Education, founded in 2020, is a workforce technology company that uses AI to bring a whole new level of clarity for learners, job seekers and decision-makers in the green economy—a broad term that includes jobs in renewable energy, energy efficiency, clean vehicles, battery and storage, grid modernization, biofuels and more.

“In the clean energy economy, we’ve found different employers are calling the same job up to 50 different things,” said Matt Evans, CEO and co-founder of Julius Education. “This is contributing to a tremendous amount of complexity in the system—making it very difficult for individual job seekers to find and understand jobs, let alone career pathways.”

“Less than 10% of job seekers can actually understand what the jobs are with any level of specificity, and at the same time, 85% of employers across the energy sector are having trouble hiring the talent they need,” he explained. “We’re working to bring solutions to address this gap.”

The Quest for Clarity
With program-related investment funding from ECMC Foundation, Julius Education strives to bring much richer Labor Market Intelligence (LMI) about the current state of the clean energy economy across different sectors. That work includes defining the actual job demand and the skills companies are looking for—down to individual job titles.

Beyond market intelligence, Julius Education also provides a suite of Workforce Tools—including online training and career navigation—which are used by learners and individuals to understand roles, see the career pathways and obtain basic skillsets and credentials to help them progress into these roles. Additionally, Julius provides employer-aligned programs that help make direct connections between job seekers and employers.

One of Julius’ differentiators is its deep partnerships with industry associations and educators, which help them reach employers and learners more authentically and at scale. Select strategic partners include the GED, the Association of Energy Services Professionals, Western Governors University, and the Center for Energy Workforce Development. Julius identifies underrepresented learners and helps them develop a relevant education pathway to their desired green economy career.

Julius’ Workforce Tools: Orientation Programs
To land roles in the clean energy industry, Julius and its partners support learners through an in-depth orientation program that provides on-ramps to impactful careers. During the program’s initial phase, Julius works with its partners to provide a foundational overview of the green economy, job readiness training, career coaching and foundational skills training, including basic entry-level certification in the industry. From there, learners progress into a local community college where they earn credits along with on-the-job training with employer partners.

“At that point, they are ready to progress either onto an apprenticeship or directly to employment,” said Evans. “Our program design is aimed at helping get people into roles, attract a much more diverse and inclusive audience, and drive outcomes for people to now earn family-sustaining wages.” 

Not surprisingly, Julius’ offering is in high demand. To date, Julius has won contracts across the country and is on a serious growth track.

First Major Employer Contract: Xcel Energy
After working primarily with government agencies and trade associations for the past few years, in 2024 Julius scored its first major employer contract, Xcel Energy, through a private/public partnership project with Minnesota to support workforce training and recruitment for an enterprise-grade solar farm. This marked an important validation point for Julius’ credibility within the industry.

Xcel Energy is building a solar workforce, as part of their efforts to transition from coal to renewables. In partnership with the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development, they selected Julius Education, Native Sun Community Power Development (a leading Minnesota-based workforce organization serving tribal communities) and the GED to develop a talent pipeline and recruit diverse, lower-income and indigenous learners for roles at Xcel and its local employer partners.

“Overall, we’re trying to demystify solar roles and career pathways, while giving learners foundational training, work readiness skills and on-ramp certifications, so they can take the appropriate next step and get placed into solar entry-level roles,” said Evans.

From the 2024 initial pilot cohort, five people completed the program and received job offers. Next year’s cohort will grow to 30 program participants.  In addition, Julius has already secured five new employer contracts, which will reach 200 job seekers.

Bridging the Gap for Broader Diversity
Julius’ approach to ensuring an inclusive transition to clean energy differentiates it from others in the space. Their model centers on deep stakeholder engagement and collaboration with a wide range of partners, including government agencies, industry associations, national workforce leaders, employers and higher education institutions. These partnerships are crucial in addressing sector-wide workforce development issues and supporting underserved populations, ensuring that opportunities in the clean energy sector are accessible to all.

“The energy transition market hasn’t been well represented in terms of diversity—so that’s another one of our focus areas,” said Evans. “Through our strategic partnerships, we are working to develop pathways for folks who have historically not been well represented in these roles and create ways to get them into these opportunities.”

Julius’ mission to build an inclusive workforce for the green energy transition and provide job seekers with a data-informed career pathway to high paying careers strongly aligns with ECMC Foundation’s focus on improving outcomes for underserved populations and its North Star goal to eliminate equity gaps in postsecondary completion by 2024, so that underserved learners have greater opportunity for social and economic mobility.