15 Oct SXSW-Eco & The Green Jobs-Economy

SXSW-Eco Oct. 4-5th, was an eye-opener for me – but not for the reasons I'd expected!

NOTE: Check-out the phenomenal Multi-Media Show "BELLA GAIA" at the Paramount – Feb. 23rd (tickets on-sale). Caught clips of this game-changing "extravaganza" of sight & sound, via C-Span (Aspen Ideas Festival-2012), when the guy who developed it, performed for a "Tech/Media" session. You'll never see the State of Planet Earth the same way again. It's a terrific thing for Global Warming  "Skeptics" to experience…many claim a total shift in awareness, after seeing it. 

As a "Green Jobs" Blogger here at AEN (and a founding Staffer at Green [Co-op] America in W.D.C.)… I've been trying to bring the "Community College/Workforce Training" perspective to the issue of "Where are the Green Jobs?" This belated post is larger, but many events & trends, are now converging for me… (is it just us – or are you all feeling a Shift in the environment)

• We have all heard, ad-nauseum, the litany of ways that the Federal Stimulus "did not work." In actuallity – the slow growth in green jobs here in Austin is much more complicated than the pundits would have you understand. Contributing factors influencing the "slow-growth" of these jobs in Austin include; the market shift towards natural gas, lowered consumer demand for green technologies (via decreased economic certainty), ever-evolving levels of efficiency + limited availability for some green-tech, limited availability of consumer & business-financing (including the "suspension" of rebates/credits via the City, in 2010). For instance, some markets in Solar have continued to do well (even "boom") while there was a stagnation in these particular jobs here in Austin. Just as over 1,000 trained solar workers were entering our local workforce with federally-funded job training (2009-2011), the need for their services "tanked." This disconnect was devastating to many folks.

• Thursday, October 4th… I was slated to connect via multiple "jobs" nodes. First, a morning tabling at the annual High School "Career Expo" (Palmer Center), where kids from all over town explore future career options. Gone, was the 40' Renewable Energy Trailer, that used to get kids jazzed about "S.T.E.M." training, for a green job (c/o of TX State SECO/TREEC college consortium – it lives in Houston now). The opportunities for young people…the sense of possibilities if they stay in Austin, is shrinking. Most of the Employers of past years did not even bother to come table at this event (it's an "employers market?"). ACC was there in-force, with many programs (including our nationally acclaimed "Clean-Tech" programs in ACC-Continuing Education and the Electronics/Advanced-Tech Depts.). ACC continues to look at the "long-range" demand predicted. A whole generation of Boomers are about to retire… and in many professions, we will see a glut of workers…then become a deficit. Will the "workforce training" of our current unemployed – respond adequately?

• I could not detect any excitement in the Palmer, over the Future in these Clean-Green careers… which was palpable a couple years ago. Students do not get a buzz checking-out these opportunities – while the SXSW Interactive/Gaming marketing broadcasts "mega-scale." Does this mean we'll see a whole generation of kids, who'll train to be I-Phone App. Programmers and Game Developers, but none of whom will want to install and repair the AC/Electric systems in our homes?  Get their hands dirty (not unlike the drift by our best & brightest from Engineering, into Wall Street – in the 90's).  Will the divide between "Blue/Green Collar" Jobs and the world of Wall Street financed "High-Tech," continue to drift into segregated directions? Why does the Texas Workforce Commission try to get Engineers to consider "retro-fitting" their careers into the Trades (HVAC, Plumbing, Construction, etc.)! Check-out Blue-Green Alliance "Good Jobs-Green Jobs" Conference, 2012.

• "RED, WHITE & GREEN: The True Colors of America’s Clean Tech Jobs" [DBL Investors, Nancy Pfund and Michael Lazar, 9/12], a report circulated by Clean Edge [presenters at SXSW], reveals data to support that "Red States" and Republican Governor's are now critical drivers in recent spikes of "Green Jobs" (even if the stand-off in D.C. would lead us to believe otherwise). Texas is mentioned briefly, in a nod to earlier gains here (3rd largest U.S. "Clean Tech" workforce, behind New York and California). If Texas is supposedly cranking-out these jobs – why is it that Austin college students have such a hard time getting an Internship in any company in this sector? One can Volunteer (as always)… but where is the momentum?

• As I travelled around lunchtime… to see an old colleague, who was one of the earliest practitioners of "Green Build" in town, I hoped they could lift my mood.  I support ACC in State of Texas/TWC Skills for Small Business grant-funding, go to: www.austincc.edu/smallbiz, and like to keep posted on what's really happening with small biz. in ATX . As we talked for the first time in over a year… I realized that their  "Green Build" business must be "stressed," and to compenstate, they were contracting to complete the interiors for the new Formula-1 Raceway. While I do hope that the Formula-1 is as "LEED-certified" as possible, the fact that one of our pioneering Green small businesses is tied to the quintissential "fossil-fuel" sport of our time… [the very symbol of  what it means to live in the Age of Carbon = Cars for Recreation), was more than a little sobering.

• Finally – arriving at the AT&T Conference Center at UT…for SXSW-Eco, I was struck numb by the contrast with what I'd seen earlier that day. The event was bursting with activity (grown to the point it needs another venue). Everyone one could see appeared young, fashionable, well-heeled, trendy, anglo. The sense I had was that a lot of "investment capital"  was present… trust-funds looking for a way to invest inheritances into "worthy capital ventures." The sky was the limit (even as Bill McKibben reminds us… our time-window is NOT limitless, and is closing very rapidly on "2o C." of Global Warming). I wanted to be as optimistic as these young "Seekers" were, and believe that although they show no sense of history/context for all the experiments that have gone before… still they'll "figure it out" & make it stick this time! Hubbert's Curve will not dictate our Destiny. If only the "1%" buying-in, can make it happen… that is a shocker. Is it down to that now? On the other hand, I see Gaps; students who cannot afford to take a "Green" Degree, if it will not result in an immediate job. The ones that did so remaining under-employed (and getting restless). All the "Talent" that Corporate America and our politicians – claim is missing in the U.S. right now. The flocking of folks to the TX gas fields, for unregulated jobs. Failure rates for small business (creeping consolidation). One starts to think of possible Futures…as a David Brin book ("He, She & It," Marge Piercy). Go to the Garden, get hands in Dirt… plant something GREEN.