Towards an equipped and skilled battery ecosystem

The session envisions to highlight the specific needs for the sustainable energy transition from the perspective of skills and job roles. By bringing together several stakeholders with different backgrounds and perspectives, such as, academic or education and training provider, industrial or institutional, we aim at providing high level insights to the policy side. Thus, contributing to the advancements of the European Green Deal as a whole, and within the Pact for Skills and EU’s Skills Agenda thematics in particular. This holds as a pressing matter due to the need of re-skilling or up-skilling 800,000 workers in the battery industry until 2025.

In the current war context, it is of the utmost importance for the EU to regain control over its energy dependence. It is also paramount to ensure we are actually in the ‘Fit for 55’ path, meaning in a sustainable way to maintain current policy set goals, towards making the EU a hub for clean energy and sustainability.

With the Critical Raw Materials Act it becomes clear that our dependencies go way beyond Russian gas.  For example, rare earths are vital for the development of the sustainable energies in various value-chains and their shortage in the rather near future is dramatic. hub

Regardless of pacing in the right direction, we must recognise that, for such a broad strategy to function, one does not simply need infrastructure, but skills are essential. This is where ALBATTS project, the Automotive Skills Alliance (ASA) or the European Battery Alliance Academy (EBAA) are highly relevant when entering the European Year of Skills. We must activate education stakeholders to enable a prepared education ecosystem that promotes customised initial education and up- and re-skilling. Otherwise, the battery value chain development and the vision of Europe as a leading hub for renewable production and storage systems can be at risk.