Five Years of U.S. Solar Job Growth Erased in Three Months: COVID

Nearly 600,000 US clean energy industry employees filed for unemployment benefits in March and April

According to the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), the United States solar energy industry has lost a whopping 65,000 jobs because of the coronavirus pandemic. This is backtracking on five long years of job gains, which is a huge blow to the solar industry in the country.

The rate of job loss within the solar industry in the US is faster than the rate of job loss in the overall US economy, according to the SEIA. As per the industry body’s examination, the solar power industry in the United States employs around 188,000 people at present. This is a marked decrease compared to the 250,000 people that were employed in the sector at the start of the year 2020. Federal relief is unlikely considering the bigger priorities that are plaguing the economy such as overall unemployment, food security and the on-going pandemic woes.

The solar industry in the US was one of the fastest growing industries in the country. Prior to the onslaught of the COVID outbreak, the SEIA had predicted that the number of jobs in solar would touch the 300,000 mark by end of H1 of 2020.

Business has been slow and revenues have taken a hit across the sector ever since the government’s shelter at home order was imposed on March 20, 2020. Under normal circumstances, this would have been the busiest time of the year for solar installers.

Leads for new customers have also declined over the past two months. The decline in jobs is due to widespread business closures and quarantine across the US. According to BW Research Partnership, nearly 600,000 US clean energy industry employees filed for unemployment benefits in the month of March as well as April. Out of this number, 96,000 were in the renewable energy space, primarily wind and solar power sector.

Surprisingly, the energy efficiency sector has been hit the hardest as opposed to solar, wind or any other sector within renewables. This is primarily because the energy efficiency industry employs a lot of people and the jobs involve having direct access to homes and offices in order to conduct studies and inspections especially in terms of LCA (life cycle analysis).

In the US solar sector, a majority of the jobs lost are within the purview of residential and commercial serving entities as compared to utility scale solar. Few companies have closed operations completely.

According to Wood Mackenzie, the recovery of the solar sector in the US will depend on multiple factors. The main factors that will aid faster recovery are how fast the country contains the spread of the novel coronavirus pandemic and how fast the overall economy recovers from this slump.

Lobbyists have been working overtime to procure industry specific aid for solar. However, in the absence of any relief the solar industry is making do with the current situation by conducting virtual inspections using photos and videos as and where possible. The SEIA is looking for crucial changes in existing federal relief programs so that small businesses within the sector can receive the funding that they desperately require in order to stay afloat in the coming months.

If the sector gains traction by Q3 of 2020, then furloughed workers might regain their jobs. However, if by any means economic recovery is delayed beyond this time period, there is a risk of many of these workers losing jobs and the solar sector being hit harder than predicted.