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While the financial crisis may have sidelined renewable energy as a viable choice for the average homeowner or small business owner, the same forces that produced this downturn may setup a perfect storm for renewables to come surging back and bring employment opportunities with them.

A lack of available financing, restricted household budgets, and plunging business profits place a damper on the exchange to renewable energy since this recession started in late 2007. Once oil and natural gas came loud down from their summer 2008 highs, renewables such as solar and micro-wind have suffered from a poor dollar cost comparison with brown energy.Despite a clear public desire to thrash off carbon-based energy, many found renewables hard to justify in terms of a personal utility choice. System sales stalled and a question mark hung over the industry’s future. Analyst recommendations for solar and wind companies followed their stock prices: down. And many who had seen a future career go into renewables found themselves dealing instead with the realities of a severe fiscal downturn. While the desire for renewables continued, the means of fulfilling it was weakened.

Today a confluence of factors may be shifting once again in favor of renewables, bringing back a surge of new system sales, investment and importantly, employment. The price of brown energy is cycling up again with crude oil back to $50/barrel, home heating oil at $2/gal and natural gas seems to have formed a bottom at $4/MBtu’s. On the investment front, significant commentary by economists and stock analysts about the lack of investment in new oil and gas production capacity is pointing at supply shortages on the 5 years horizon. In the near term, Plates’s internal stimulus packages are usually recognized to be effectual in restoring fiscal growth at the same time that the American economy is seeing glimmers of positive news. Blocks and blocks of foreclosed, abandoned and scavenger-gutted housing stock in cities across America present a chance for restoring them with renewable energy technologies. And perhaps most telling, the new administration has made renewable energy a centerpiece of its agenda and confirmed it off limits in budget negotiations with congress. This welcome stabilizing of the recession points to increased energy consumption as the world economy re-inflates, with increased prices and employment following on its heels.

So how to ride this new wave of opportunities in renewable energy? The same as you ride any wave: with a surfboard and some skill, remembering to add in a touch of bravery.  In the case of varying careers into renewable energy, the “surfboard” is basic knowledge about the science and technology of solar, wind and geothermal, how such systems work, the skills used in assessing a residential or commercial site, the financing and  ROI calculations, and system design and installation details. This set of knowledge and skills is the foundation for understanding and working with renewable energy.  Complementing this knowledge,  an understanding of the industry and how it is structured and the wider trends at work in and on it enables one to make informed choices.  Rather than riding the same wave as everyone else, a broader education brings a broader view and the ability to plot well for the future. As with any career go – one made by choice or by having the choice forced upon us – a touch of bravery overcomes the inertia that so evenly prevents us taking the first step.

To get the career equivalent of the surfboard, seek out education and training options that will get renewable energy knowledge and skills in your hands sooner rather than later. But, try not to set yourself up to be overwhelmed with the transition by plotting multiple classes spread out to give yourself time to absorb and use what you learn. The brown energy infrastructure has taken 150 years to be build up: it won’t exchange overnight and most people alive today have never dealt with “energy” beyond the electrical outlet in the wall. An increasing number of community colleges, solar and wind equipment manufacturers and training companies are offering classes and workshops in renewable energy. Ranging from hands on training geared for technicians to install solar panels and erect wind turbines to courses in renewable energy sales and marketing, these classes will add renewable energy knowledge and skill to your resume and proffer it beyond your previous career. 

With a new, upward trend in energy expenditure and strong motivation to re-tool America’s buildings off brown energy, $15 billion per year promised by the new administration and signs of fiscal stability on the horizon, now is the time to pursue the many training providers across the country for knowledge and skills in renewable energy.Few other recessions in the post World War II era have been as severe as this one. Nor have they had such a perfect storm of conditions built-in to bring about an explosion of new fiscal growth to end them. Catch the wave. The time to teach for the coming exchange from the brown energy of the past to the renewable energy of a recovered economy is now.