Green collar jobs: Employment in environment friendly and energy efficient sector

Green collar job is the latest trend in the job market and employment sector. Green collar is an environment friendly job related to renewable energy and clean energy. Green collar job will soon become dream job of Americans. Arousal of green technology will make it possible.

We are familiar with the blue collar and White collar jobs in different employment sectors. Blue collar jobs involve manual labor or work with machines and White collar job includes clerical workers and salaried professionals. Emerging new sector is green. It is growing in both popularity and support. Green technology is an emerging field in technology sector.

What is green-collar job?

Green collar jobs involve environment-friendly products and services. Business that improve environment is considered green. It creates green collar jobs while employing individuals. Green collar jobs include designing, manufacturing, installation, operation and maintenance of renewable energy and energy efficient technologies.

There is an attempt to answer these questions from Phil Angelides. He is a venture capitalist and Democratic candidate for governor of California (2006).

Angelides, Chairman, Apollo Alliance, defined green collar job in a discussion of Greencast. He defined it as a job that reduces waste and pollution and benefits the environment. In addition green collar job has to pay decent wages and benefits that can support a family and has to be part of a real career path with upward mobility.

(The Apollo Alliance is a coalition of labor, business, environmental, and community leaders working to catalyze a clean energy revolution that will put millions of Americans to work in a new generation of high-quality, green-collar jobs).

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Some jobs are obviously in the green collar category like manufacturing solar panels or wind turbines. Some people describe it in such narrow sense. However, according to Apollo Alliance, a green-collar job can be anything that helps put America on the path to a cleaner, more energy efficient future.

The green collar sector is booming. It has the fifth largest market share in job and employment sector presently in the US.

Green sector is much debated topic at the federal level. Global warming is traditionally favorite topic of discussion for the governments, politicians, economists and environmentalists. Put economy and environment together and you will have a topic for intense congressional debate.

The US congress had been advocating creation of green collar jobs since last few years. They have been promoting energy efficiency through workforce programs and incentives.

Candidates of last Presidential election John McCain, Obama and Hillary Clinton commonly advocated for green-collar jobs. Barack Obama referenced to spend one hundred fifty billion dollars in ten years to create five million new green-collar jobs.

Clinton promised that her energy plan would create millions of new green-collar jobs. McCain was less willing to spell numbers. Although he also assured that action to de-carbonize economy of America would produce not thousands but millions of new jobs in the US.

All these sound great. They stood up for cleaning the environment and to control global warming. All of them claimed to create green collar jobs, an entirely new sector of employment.

Large numbers of Blue collar and white collar jobs will be converted and transmitted to green collar jobs.

Some of the labor leaders think green job as a way to keep manufacturing alive in America and fight outsourcing. There is a strong political motivation to green-collar jobs. Presidential candidates’ loved talking about those.

Creation of green collar jobs in renewable energy can trigger environmental consciousness. Large numbers of senators believed this spearheaded by Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. They have been proposing huge amount of grant monies to states to exhibit labor exchange and training programs in the green sector.

Organizations demonstrating leadership in green programs and in promoting renewable energy and energy efficiency will get preference in these grants. It seems that green collar job will soon be in driving seat in employment sector replacing blue collar and white collar jobs.

Push for such jobs in renewable energy is alive in many cities across the country. Residents of San Francisco, California are pioneer to patron businesses and organizations actively promoting renewable energy. They prefer to see it in their business practices and through the creation of green collar jobs. Washington D.C. has also initiated a green job campaign. They like to invest in its workforce through environmentally conscious programs.

Academicians have released large number of papers trumpeting potential for green collar jobs. University of Tennessee and RAND Corporation have researched and generated a report on it. According to the report, America would generate at least five million new green jobs by 2025 if it produces twenty five percent of all energy from renewable sources.

 I have mentioned about state of green collar jobs in America. Many other countries in rest of the world are also taking steps to be green.

India has signed treaties with France, America and other countries for nuclear energy. Large numbers of Electric scooters can be seen  running over Indian roads. India is also pioneering in growing  healthy food from organic farming.

India is one of the most benefited country in carbon points. There are wind energy projects in Indian coastal area and solar energy projects in the desert. India is also doing remarkably in water conservation programs. All these are creating green collar jobs in India.

At last, but not the least, India is pioneer and world leader in recycling solid waste. Approximately five million people are involved in recycling. What will you say? Is it a blue collar job or green collar?

Tasmanian industrialists in Australia met with their prime minister to promote green sector. European union countries, especially Luxembourg, Netherlands, Switzerland and Scandinavian countries have done significantly in creating green collar jobs.

Dubai is a green city in the deserts of middle east. Caribbean islands are also doing well in this field.

Environment Management System ISO 14001 shows way to manage environment efficiently. This is a popular system all over the world. It leads to manage organizations environment friendly, green, clean and energy efficient. many organizations in India, America and rest of the world have adopted this system. It has become a tool to generate green collar jobs.

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