I was delighted to see a press release from Centennial College in Toronto promoting its creation of part-time evening courses in wind and solar technology and installation.

“A shortage of technicians with the right skills has prevented this budding energy sector from growing as quickly as it could,” according to the college, which said the coureses will be focused on urban installations connected to the grid. “Centennial College is addressing the lack of ‘distributed generation’ technicians with two new post-graduate certificates in wind or solar energy generation, conversion and control.”

Herb Sinnock, courses coordinator, says solar-panel installers are apparently having a difficult time finding people with the right skills. Finding the right people is important, given that these systems will be feeding into the local power grid and there will undoubtedly be concerns about their impact on grid stability and integrity of the electricity distribution network.

Centennial isn’t stopping with just these two courses. The college says it is currently putting together a full-time program in “integrated energy systems technology” that could launch by next fall. “The program will introduce post-secondary students to solar, wind, hydro, biomass and other distributed generation systems that can be readily integrated into commercial and residential buildings.”

I’ve been harping on this skills issue for a year now. Fact is, Canada is doing well in the area of renewables (see this new report comparing Canada with other countries), and Ontario is doing better, but much more can be done to capture the momentum. Kudos to Centennial for recognizing the opportunities, both current and future, in this emerging clean-energy sector and assessing the job market in advance of Ontario introducing its much-applauded and highly anticipated “standard offer contract” program. This, of course, will establish feed-in tariffs for small renewable energy systems and blaze a trail for other provinces and states to follow. Expect the program to launch in the first half of next year.

BTW: I’ve also heard the Ontario Centre of Excellence for Energy, established in January, is assessing the skills market in the province to identify any skills gaps in the clean energy sector that will need to be filled.

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