Kansas City Exceeds Need for Electricians as Green Energy Grows The U.S. energy transition is driving demand for trade workers

Naomi Alexander spent two years studying accounting at Missouri Southern State University before deciding it was not the right path for her. When her father, a lifelong sprinkler fitter, suggested she consider a trade career, he “lit a fire” in her, she said. 

After doing some research, Alexander enrolled in the Missouri Apprentice Ready Program, which exposes people to different trade careers.  

The program introduced her to electrical work and connected her with local union electricians, who told her about the good pay and benefits they received. Her affinity for electrical work surprised her, she said. 

“I was somebody that was going to school for white-collar work. I had never really thought about getting into a blue-collar trade, even though my father was my entire life,” Alexander said. “It’s just not the path that I thought I was supposed to take.” 

Alexander said financial freedom and security were major motivators for her. She said the profession offers long-term security, because she doesn’t see the need for electricians declining anytime soon. 

“Because of the electrical, technological world that we live in, electricians are always going to be needed, no matter what,” she said. “This whole energy reform that’s going on around the states and the infrastructure money being put into helping to make the world more green, that’s gonna require electricians.” 

U.S. Energy Transition Drives Up Demand for Electricians   

The U.S. energy transition — including shifts toward more renewable energy sources and more energy-efficient technologies to reduce emissions — has manifested as more solar panels and wind turbines, electric and hybrid vehicles, and heat pumps and electric stoves. It also requires factories to build them.  

Installing, maintaining and repairing these technologies — and building and maintaining the factories that produce them — requires electricians, according to Shon Lee, training director at the Kansas City Joint Apprenticeship and Training Committee. 

He said the energy transition is already increasing demand for electricians. However, despite warnings that the country writ-large won’t be able to keep up with this demand, he said that in the Kansas City area, interest in the profession has already exceeded the JATC’s capacity, driving the program to expand in recent years.   

“Interest has been really high. We average between 100-200 applicants per month. … In the last ten to fifteen years, we had anywhere from 30 to 40 or 60 applicants per month, so it’s gone up quite a bit,” Lee said. “One reason is that people know that there’s a lot of construction work in the Kansas City area right now.” 

There are a number of large-scale projects currently driving demand for electricians, including new Google and Meta data centers and a new Panasonic electric vehicle battery factory where Alexander — now a second-year apprentice with the JATC — is currently working. 

Bo Moreno, business manager for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers 124, which represents local indoor electrical workers, said the Panasonic facility alone is expected to employ 900 electricians.  

He said that although there have been periods of growth in the past, this moment feels different. 

“Honestly, we’re in unprecedented times. Typically, you have a certain amount of work that has a start date and an end date. Now, it just seems like we’re looking at multiple, multiple years of work,” Moreno said. “Before, you’d look at maybe the next three years’ worth of work. Now, we’re looking at, realistically, maybe the next decade.” 

The labor force has been able to keep up with demand so far, he said, and continued expansion will help it meet demand as it grows with the announcement of new projects. 

Through the five-year apprenticeship program at the JATC, aspiring electricians work with local electrical companies while attending classes.  

Lee said the program has been at near “full employment” for its apprentices, meaning that when a project ends, apprentices are quickly assigned to a new one. 

“Right now, because of the amount of work in our jurisdiction, employers are needing help,” Lee said. “If I have an apprentice laid off today, I can effectively get them back out to work tomorrow. There’s virtually no unemployment time.” 

There hasn’t been the same abundance of jobs for IBEW 53, the chapter serving outdoor electrical linemen, according to Ben Bush, business manager for the union.  

He said many of the current projects involve more indoor electrical work, but he believes that will change soon. 

“Going forward, if everything goes according to what I’ve heard over the last couple of years, (the amount of work will) absolutely increase. Work for us is expected to boom significantly over the next five to ten years,” Bush said.  

However, he said, politics could play a role. By incentivizing the construction of green infrastructure and technology projects, the Inflation Reduction Act has been a main driver of the energy transition in the U.S. 

The law also requires companies to employ a certain number of apprentices on worksites to access government money, helping spur the training and employment of a new generation of electricians and other tradesmen. 

The coming presidential election could mark a shift in priorities and either increase or decrease funding for these projects, he said. 

Math and Reading Comprehension Scores Hinder Further Growth 

In 2023, the JATC received more than 1,400 applications, up from the mid-900s in 2022 and 2021.  

In just the first seven months of 2024, he added, the JATC has accepted around 270 applicants, and he believes it will add another 100 before the end of the year. 

However, growth in the number of applicants accepted into the apprenticeship and pre-apprenticeship programs has not kept pace with the increasing number of people applying for them. In 2023, Lee estimated that the program accepted around 240 applicants, compared to around 230 in 2022 and 220 in 2021.  

Part of the challenge, Lee said, is the sheer size of the applicant pool. The JATC only has so many classrooms for apprentices and so many instructors to teach them. Lee said he and other program leaders are looking at hiring more teachers and even expanding their facility. 

“It doesn’t matter what it takes, we will meet the demand,” he said. “We have the applicants available, the manpower. If we have to build a bigger training facility, whatever it would take, I know that we would meet that demand. We’ve already discussed that,” 

“I feel very safe saying that, over the course of five years, we will double where we were at five years prior,” Lee added. 

Duke Dujakovich, the president of the Greater Kansas City AFL-CIO — which represents 57 area unions, including the two local chapters of the IBEW — said that besides program capacity, there is another major challenge for the IBEW and other trade unions: algebra. 

 “The problem is quite simple — it’s one word: math,” Dujakovich said. “Math skills are incredibly important in construction, and a lot of people think ‘This is something I’m never going to need.’ I can tell you right now, art history is something I never needed in my life, not one single time. But math I need every single day.”  

“Until we can get math scores improved in the high schools, it’s going to be difficult to get people into a lot of the trades,” Dujakovich added. “That’s the number one thing that knocks people out.” 

The local chapters of the IBEW, like other Kansas City-area unions, have been trying to improve the diversity of their membership and, by extension, their respective industries, Dujakovich said. 

The math component has proved particularly frustrating for this initiative, according to Moreno. 

“One of the (challenges) for some of the lower-income places and in some minority communities (is) we have a certain standard we have to abide by because of the technical aspect of the work we do. We have to do a lot of advanced math,” Moreno said. “We really push algebra, because to even be able to get an interview, you have to pass an aptitude test.” 

The reading comprehension part of the aptitude test also presents a challenge, Lee said. 

“I think a lot of people, because they’re avid or good readers, kind of assume, ‘Oh, I’m good at reading comprehension.’ But, based on the scores, it seems like some people sometimes should pay attention to both of those areas,” Lee said. 

Dujakovich said overcoming these hurdles is critical to reaching people who are excited about pursuing a career in the trades.  

“When I go to East High School, there are a lot of low-income kids, a lot of kids for whom English is not their first language,” Dujakovich said. “Those kids want to get jobs, and they want to know ‘Okay, how do I get on the fire department? How do I become an iron worker? How do I do this?’ 

“That’s the audience that I’ve got to get in front of — there’s a lot of talent. I had a good friend who said, ‘Talent doesn’t have a zip code, but opportunity does.’ That’s exactly right,” he added. 

Alexander said she’s seen an “uptick” in both gender and racial diversity among electricians and other tradesmen on the job sites where she’s worked, an improvement from the “Good Ole Boys’ Club” she said the IBEW and other unions used to be. 

“(Construction is) definitely a male-dominated industry. It’s just always been that way. There have been women who have been in the trades for 20, 30 years, but they’re kind of the anomaly,” Alexander said. “But the past five to ten years have been seeing a huge boom in women in trades.” 

However, she said, there is still progress to be made.  

“As for the diversity right now on the job site, it’s mostly white males, and then there’s a small percentage of African American or Black (workers) and a large number of Hispanic Americans, and then the number of women is pretty low,” she said. “The diversity is not the greatest, but I feel like me and other women and other minorities getting in is going to help pave the way for the next people to come in and see that this is an opportunity they can take.” 

Trades See Rise in Interest 

Thirty-two-year-old Spencer Smith is also taking part in the Missouri Works Initiative, which includes the Missouri Apprentice Ready program. He said he’s interested in becoming an electrician because it hits his “trifecta” of math, mechanics and working with his hands.  

Smith previously worked as an Amazon delivery driver and did a string of other “pretty horrible and tough” jobs before learning about the Missouri Works Initiative and the trades through a job fair hosted at the high school where his father works. 

He said his dad “gave me cards and information, and I signed up. I never would’ve known about it had it not been for that job fair.” 

Gabriel Esteban, a recent graduate of Lincoln College Prep who’s now a part of the Missouri Works Initiative, said he became interested in the trades after talking with Rudy Chavez — the Kansas City coordinator for the Missouri Apprentice Ready program — at a career fair through his high school. 

“During my junior year in high school, we went to a career fair, and I got to see Rudy there,” Esteban said. “I’ve seen some people at my previous jobs who are older, and I would ask ‘Why are you not retired?’ and they’d say, ‘I don’t have enough money to retire.’ I heard that the (trades’) pensions pay really well and they benefit you in your retirement.” 

These interactions are the product of efforts by local unions to raise awareness about careers in the trades among young people. Lee said that besides the abundance of work for electricians and other tradespeople, sharing information about what working in the trades is really like has helped to increase interest. 

“I really feel like there’s a resurgence for apprenticeship programs. I don’t think that a lot of people were familiar with how it worked, and a lot of high school counselors weren’t really aware of the skilled trades being a viable option for someone finishing high school,” Lee said.  

“It seems like the college route was the most favored, and people are finding out that apprenticeships are a viable option for people who don’t want to go through college or incur the college debt,” he added. 

Moreno said he and other representatives from the local IBEW chapters have seen a good amount of interest when they visit high schools and middle schools. 

“We’ve seen a lot of interest garnered because the ones who are really interested in the electrical (path), you can see it. It fascinates them,” Moreno said. “But they also realize that everything’s going towards that.” 

Lee said the JATC sees the greatest interest in May, around the time of high school graduations. 

Even so, Dujakovich said, because many apprenticeship programs require a high school diploma, some students who might be well-suited to the trades, but not traditional schooling could fall through the cracks. 

“What if you decide early on that you want to be an electrician, or a paramedic, or a firefighter? Why are we making you sit there for four years and teaching you stuff that you’re not going to need to know?” he said. 

That’s why he said the AFL-CIO and local educational and vocational partners have been working together to try to develop a program through which high school students could earn their GED by completing career training, such as getting an EMT license or training to become an electrician.  

“That’s going to be the solution,” Dujakovich said. “We cannot wait until people graduate from high school to start thinking about trainings and careers and which way they want to go.”