Heat and Decentralised Energy Conference 2021 | Reflections and Resources
The Heat and Decentralised Energy Conference, hosted by the ADE and Energy Institute, took place from 29 September to 1 October. Following on from the success of last year’s event and with the uncertainty of the pandemic still present, we again hosted the conference virtually, welcoming more than 600 delegates to sessions across three days. This year’s theme was “Green Jobs and Skills”, focussing on a central element of the transition towards net zero that is often overlooked. However, ensuring we have the right workforce in place with the right skills will be crucial to meeting our net zero targets.Delegates were able to attend a wide variety of sessions, from a ‘Dragon’s Den’ style session, sponsored by Chronos Energy, where speakers from the minewater, heat pump, heat network and hydrogen sectors could pitch the attractiveness of their sector to a panel of jobseekers, to the more traditional sessions focussing on policy. Delegates were also able to hear from some of the stars of our video series focussed on drawing attention to the job opportunities that will be created by decentralised energy, and watch the videos themselves.Across the three days some key themes emerged around how to market green jobs to the right people and how to train and reskill this workforce: The energy industry needs to stop calling jobs of the future ‘green jobs’ and making our focus the ‘green’ aspect. Instead, we should be ensuring the energy industry is producing good jobs offering long-term sustainable, exciting careers. All jobs should be green in the future. This approach is necessary for the energy industry to compete with other sectors. Skill sets such as software designers will also be in demand in the tech and finance sectors, which are likely to offer higher salaries. This approach will also appeal to job seekers who aren’t already green evangelicals – we need different perspectives and skill sets. When recruiting and imagining the workforce of the future we need to not think about diversity per se, but appreciate difference, and consider what different areas of society and characteristics can bring to the workforce and help solve the challenges of decarbonising the system. The size of the potential market is sizeable in all low carbon sectors of the energy market, and equally as appealing to job seekers. We need to be educating in schools now about the opportunities that are coming up and try and tackle the drop off in women studying STEM subjects in secondary school.We sincerely hope that everyone who was involved in Heat and Decentralised Energy 2021 took something valuable from it. We would love to hear your feedback on the event and continue the conversation. Find out how to get in touch with us below. If you missed any sessions, you can catch up with all of the action from Heat and Decentralised Energy Conference on our Vimeo Channel.Catch up on Heat and Decentralised Energy 2020 on our Vimeo. All sessions now available to watch again:https://vimeo.com/user117350025Interested in joining the ADE?Email john.bryant@theade.co.ukHave some feedback on our events, or want to partner with us?Email external.affairs@theade.co.ukEngage with us on Social Media:Twitter: https://twitter.com/theADEukLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/1159788/admin/