With realising the ambition of the UK’s Hydrogen Strategy dependent on building a skilled workforce, Hydrogen Safe has unveiled a new Hydrogen Skills Framework in a bid to do exactly that.
With Greater Manchester pushing to reach net zero by 2038, the collaboratively designed roadmap wants to address the region’s skills needs within the hydrogen sector. It does this by analysing the current labour and skills market in the region, profiling occupations across the whole of the hydrogen value chain spanning primary sectors such as production and distribution, through to the secondary ones of consumption, cross-cutting, safety and enabling.
Through this, it believes that not only will this help Greater Manchester, but it can serve as a blueprint for building a scalable, sustainable hydrogen economy that can be used as a national template.
Setting out the scale of the challenge, Hydrogen Safe uncovered a number of obstacles that stand in the way of establishing a hydrogen economy from the perspective of skills: skills transfer and upskilling; upskilling the existing labour market; the unknown skills needed for education, industry and local authorities; attracting new entrants; retaining skills in the labour market; and the distribution of skills funding for local authorities.
Therefore, moving forward, there is a need to increase public awareness for the hydrogen economy – ensuring broad understanding support of the career opportunities and lifestyle changes – and key steps that can be taken to plug the skills gap.
Beginning with building public awareness, recommendations include carrying out public education and outreach on hydrogen technology and its role in the future energy landscape, as well as involving local communities in discussions about the potential impacts and benefits of hydrogen projects in their areas.
Efforts should also include leveraging local media and influencers, public demonstration projects, teaming up with local organisations to expand outreach efforts, and integrating hydrogen-related content into school and college curricula to increase awareness among both younger generations and education staff.
Turning to its recommendations to drive the Hydrogen Skills Framework forwards, Hydrogen Safe is calling for the creation of a shared vision, with collaboration between educators and organisations to align training with value chain development, helping reflect policy and investment certainty for hydrogen’s role in the energy transition, and the development of skills pathways. This means educators, industry and government need to adapt training programmes, certifications and qualifications to address high-impact occupational shifts.
Local and combined authorities, as well as Skills England, have a role to play in building skills systems that reflect and feed into both local and national priorities such as hydrogen and clean power skills, while the education market and private sector need to update existing training programmes, standards, qualifications, and degree courses to meet the demands of the hydrogen economy. Further recommendations include supporting the current workforce, facilitating multiple training routes and addressing gender diversity.
