The Better Buildings Workforce Accelerator (BBWA) includes nearly 40 organizations across a diverse array of sectors that have committed to enhancing the energy efficiency workforce through three key areas: building interest, streamlining pathways, and improving skills. Partners provided updates on the progress toward their goals at the BBWA’s first quarterly meeting in December.
These goals represent a variety of activities from developing new workforce programs to engaging underrepresented communities and creating new resources such as curricula, trainings, websites, and education modules. Collectively, partner goals demonstrate significant opportunities to develop a workforce that is well equipped to support the transition toward a higher-performing building stock.
The U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon and the Institute for Market Transformation (IMT) spoke about progress toward workforce development goals.
The Solar Decathlon is a collegiate competition with 10 contests that inspire student teams to design and build highly efficient buildings powered by renewables, while also taking into consideration affordability, resilience, and occupant health. The Solar Decathlon is developing building education modules focused on architecture and engineering roles and making them available to the public to access, learn from, and integrate into their own educational resources. Once developed, these modules will be freely available online.
IMT, a Better Buildings Affiliate partner, recently launched its Building Innovation Hub. This hub provides peer connections and actionable resources to help building owners in Washington, D.C. reduce energy-related operating costs, increase market competitiveness, and create more resilient and healthier properties. IMT’s Building Innovation Hub is designed in-part to support compliance with D.C.’s Building Energy Performance Standard (BEPS), which will eventually apply to buildings over 10,000 square feet in the district.
To stay up-to-date on the Accelerator’s progress, visit the Better Buildings Workforce Accelerator on the Better Buildings Solution Center and sign up for the listserv.