How to ensure Alberta’s oil and gas workers have jobs during the energy transition

By Joshua M. Pearce, Western University

Retraining Alberta’s oil and gas workers for the solar industry costs far less than you think. The results of our new study clearly show that a rapid transition to sustainable energy production is feasible, as costs of retraining oil and gas workers are far from prohibitive.

Probable futures

The oil and gas industry has played a crucial part in Alberta’s political structure for decades. Alberta contains about 97 per cent of all oil stores in Canada, which ranks third globally for oil and gas exports.

Over 20 per cent of the GDP and 5.9 per cent of all employment in Alberta is tied to the oil and gas industry, which employs over 35,000 people.

However, many factors — including increasing electrification, reduction in renewable energy costs and climate policy — are aligning to annihilate Alberta’s traditional fossil-fuel focused energy industry. This raises a real concern for oil and gas workers’ jobs in the near future.

A confluence of events

Purchases of electric vehicles (EVs) are already up 35 per cent this year after a record year, and predicted to increase. This indicates that oil-based transportation is quickly coming to an end.

In addition to lower costs of ownership, EVs can also offer electric grid support by acting like mobile batteries that can help overcome the renewable energy intermittency challenge by storing wind and solar electricity for when they are needed. In addition, conventional electric storage reduces electricity costs while servicing the grid with intermittent generators.

These technologies not only help expand opportunities for renewable energy technologies, but they also electrify transportation, which directly undermines the market for the oil industry.

Similarly, the market for the gas industry is challenged by the use of electric-powered heat pumps. In North America, solar-powered heat pumps have already become economically viable. And for the first time in history heat pump sales outperformed conventional natural gas furnaces in the United States.

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