By Curt Cherewayko
Delta-Q Technologies Corp. has had to look far and wide for engineers with the skills needed to develop and build its specialized energy products.
The Burnaby company, which manufactures microprocessor-equipped power converters that charge electric and hybrid industrial vehicles, has hired embedded-software, mechanical and power-electronics engineers from China, Korea and all over Europe.
Delta-Q’s hiring spree – 34 employees last year, nearly doubling its workforce – has been fuelled by a $17 million financing that it closed last May.
Though it increased sales 30% last year, it faces numerous growth constraints, including finding enough power-electronics engineers.
“I don’t mean the guys just fresh out of school,” said Lloyd Gomm, Delta-Q’s director of product management.
“We need them in the mix as well, but we need the really experienced guys who have been out there doing it 10 years. There’s not a lot of them in our local market, so we’ve had to cast the net pretty wide and internationally.”
Many companies on Business in Vancouver’s list of B.C.’s biggest alternative energy companies (see page 20) increased staff numbers in 2010 – though Delta-Q hired more than others on the list.
Growth for alternative energy companies coincides with a looming shortage of workers that are specialized in green and clean technologies.
According to the provincial government’s 2009-19 labour market outlook for B.C., 147,000 direct full-time green jobs will be required in 2020 – a 25% increase over 2008’s green labour force.
Factoring in the estimated employment attrition rate, which will result largely from boomers retiring from the workforce, the labour market outlook says B.C.’s economy could face shortages of more than 60,000 skilled green workers by 2020.
Already faced with a homegrown shortage of talent, Delta-Q doesn’t headhunt locally.
“It’s really an etiquette thing,” said Delta-Q’s head of human resources Max Mollineaux.
“We want the industry in B.C. to flourish as a whole, which is in our best interest as well.”
On January 7, after B.C. posted the largest job losses of any Canadian province in December, the BC Federation of Labour, though vague on details, called on the provincial government to develop a strategy for the province that included an agenda for creating green jobs.
“Rebuilding B.C.’s physical infrastructure is long overdue and can create good, green jobs,” said the federation.
ECO Canada’s December 2010 Defining the Green Economy report notes that settling on a definition of a so-called green job is part of the challenge of addressing a potential shortage of green workers.
More specifically, the debate is about how narrow or broad the definition of a green job should be; many companies see the benefits of branding themselves green, with or without a formal definition.
In its September report, British Columbia’s Green Economy: Securing the Workforce of Tomorrow, the Vancouver-based non-profit Globe Foundation takes a stab at defining a green job in the B.C. economy: “when an occupation produces an output or lowers the price of a product that offers positive environmental externalities, this may be considered in whole or in part a green job.”
The foundation, which advocates sustainable development policies, also divides the green economy into six sectors:
- clean and alternative energy;
- energy management and efficiency;
- green building;
- environmental protection;
- carbon finance and investment; and
- green knowledge and support.
It noted that one year ago B.C.’s major projects inventory listed 62 green and clean energy projects worth $12 billion under construction in B.C. Another $52 billion in projects has been proposed for development in the province, including those related to 27 electricity purchase agreements that were signed between BC Hydro and independent power producers in 2010.
For B.C. to meet demands on its green labour force, the foundation recommends policy adjustments that address the pending shortage of green workers while simultaneously addressing other issues in B.C.
According to the Globe report, “public policy initiatives that focus on increasing productivity and labour market participation rates of under-represented groups – such as aboriginal persons, women, youth and immigrants – are needed.”
It also recommends creating programs that recognize the foreign qualifications and credentials of immigrants in connection with green occupations that are in short supply. The report says that would ease labour market pressures and help integrate new arrivals into the “fabric of B.C.’s society.”
The Globe recommendations take into consideration that while many jobs in the emerging green economy will be similar in scope and skill requirements to jobs held by today’s carpenters, millwrights, lab technicians, construction workers and others, new technologies and practices will require additional skills and training.
The foundation added that initiatives in which employers and training institutions collaborate to match labour demand with supply will also be needed.
Delta-Q has already begun communicating with universities about what it requires from potential recruits who have just graduated.
The company has paid for one engineer to return to school to obtain a PhD in power electronics.
It’s working with the University of British Columbia to create a PhD power-electronics program for another Delta-Q engineer.
Said Mollineaux: “The engineer is working with professors at the university to structure a PhD program that will be beneficial not only to the individual and the university, but to us as well.” •