The number of Australians workers moving away from renewable energy has gone up, which is driven by a continued contraction of the roof-top solar sector.
From 2015 to 2016, more than 2000 renewable jobs were lost, according to ABS estimates, including cutting the national wind-power workforce to 620. There were 11,150 full-time equivalent workers were in renewables in 2015-16, down from a high of 19,220 in 2011-12. Since then, the renewable sector has declined every year.
According to Olivia Kember, head of policy at The Climate Institute, the federal government’s decision to cut the Renewable Energy Target in 2015 had damaged the renewable industry. She also said that a 16% decline since last year is a direct result of the government’s failure to set a national strategy for clean and modern energy.
A report from The Australia Institute last year predicted jobs in renewables will go up each year until 2020. And since the numbers of jobs in renewables started being published by the ABS, the sector has been dominated by the spike and consecutive fall in employment in roof-top solar, and matching the growth and decline in government subsidies.