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Inland Empire & Desert Region
October 2008

In This Issue

Customized Reports
Green Economy Studies
About the Center

Quick Links

It's a rocky era for California and the nation, yet full of opportunity. In the last couple of months, numerous reports have been released that identify the importance of clean and green spending enacted by state and federal government. One report estimates that a green program that invests $100 billion over two years would create 2 million new jobs nationwide and 89,000 jobs in California. Learn more about the evolving green sector and related training opportunities by downloading the reports below.

Also below are customized reports from this last quarter. Keep a look out for the next Environmental Scan report on LEED Certification to be released next month.

Regards,

Kevin Fleming, Director
Inland Empire Center of Excellence
(909) 382-4037
kfleming@sbccd.edu

Customized Reports

Landscaping

Landscaping Occupations
Requested by Barstow College, this report documents that there is not a strategic opportunity in developing a Landscaping/ Xeroscaping program, expect perhaps within a Community Education program. The report includes statistics for the greater Barstow and Victorville areas. Click here for the full report. <link>

GIS Industry Analysis: East Valley
This report summarizes business information for the eight cities in San Bernardino County nicknamed the "East Valley." An explanation of NAICS codes along with a breakdown of the top industries are provided. Read on . . . <link>

Transportation and Warehouse Occupations: Inland Empire
Requested by San Bernardino Valley College, this report identifies the labor market projections for transportation and warehouse related occupations. Our region can expect to experience a 12% growth within this cluster within the next 5 years; a growth rate that far exceeds the state's average of 6%.
Get the report here. <link>

Green Economy Studies
Green Recovery: A Program to Create Good Jobs and Start Building a Low-Carbon Economy
(Center for American Progress, September 2008)
This report demonstrates how a new Green Recovery program that spends $100 billion over two years would create 2 million new jobs, with a significant proportion in the struggling construction and manufacturing sectors. The proposed green recovery and infrastructure investment program would:

* Create 2 million new jobs nationwide over two years.
* Create nearly four times more jobs than spending the same amount of money within the oil industry and 300,000 more jobs than a similar amount of spending directed toward household consumption.
* Create roughly triple the number of good jobs-paying at least $16 dollars an hour-as spending the same amount of money within the oil industry.

Full Report <link >

Wind<link> Green Jobs Guidebook: Employment Opportunities in the New Clean Economy
(Environmental Defense Fund, September 2008)
The Green Jobs Guidebook is a resource for job seekers, students, guidance counselors, career advisors, policy makers and anyone else interested in knowing about the tremendous potential of California's existing and growing green jobs marketplace. The guidebook is an expansive listing of green jobs throughout the California economy that includes job descriptions, salary information, minimum education requirements, potential certifications, employer types, job market growth potential, and much more. Click here for the full report and summary. <link>

Green Jobs: Towards Decent Work in a Sustainable, Low-Carbon World
(WorldWatch Institute, September 2008)
This report assembles evidence for currently existing green jobs in key economic sectors (renewable energy, buildings and construction, transportation, basic industry, agriculture, and forestry) and presents estimates for future green employment. The pace of green job creation is likely to accelerate in the years ahead. A global transition to a low-carbon and sustainable economy can create large numbers of green jobs across many sectors of the economy, and indeed can become an engine of development. Current green job creation is taking place in both the rich countries and in some of the major developing economies.

Full Report <link >

Solar <link> Harvesting California's Renewable Energy Resources: A Green Jobs Business Plan
(Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technologies, August 2008)
California is uniquely blessed with some of the best renewable resources (solar, geothermal, wind, biomass) on the planet. This gives California the opportunity to lead the nation in creation of new green jobs. Among the primary findings of this report are the following:

* If California obtained a third of its electricity from renewable energy by 2020, state manufacturing employment could increase by almost 200,000 jobs.
* Complying with this goal could pump as much as $60 billion into the state's stagnating economy.
* With the price of natural gas and coal rising dramatically, and the state unemployment rate at its highest level in five years, it is incumbent upon policy makers to recognize renewable sources create more than six times the amount of jobs as development of these fossil fuels. A large portion of the money we currently spend on imported and polluting fossil fuels can be spent instead on creating permanent stable employment for Californians.

Access the full report here. <link>

Green Collar Workers and Other Mythical Creatures
(Labor Market and Career Information Department, Texas Workforce Commission, August 2008)
Labor market analysts have to cut through the fog of overlapping, conflicting and even nonsensical uses of the terms "green jobs" and "green collar workers" before they can give valid and reliable counts of workers employed in them, provide employment demand growth estimates and identify the requisite KSAs for green employment (as opposed to employment in their non-green predecessors). This monograph explores the myths and mysteries of green collar jobs and offers an action agenda to aid workforce professionals in understanding and implementing job training requirements imposed by Title X of the Green Jobs Act of 2007. Read on . . . <link>

About the Center

The Centers of Excellence, in partnership with business and industry, deliver regional workforce research customized for community college decision making and resource development.

The Inland Empire Center of Excellence (COE) is one of ten statewide Economic & Workforce Development initiatives <link> funded by the California Community Colleges Chancellor's Office to assist community colleges in responding to emerging workforce needs. Through the collection of primary & secondary research, GIS analysis, and industry validation interviews, the COE compile industry profiles with occupational trends, training and skill requirements, and recommendations on how regional community colleges can respond.

Regional scan reports are disseminated via this bulletin and past reports for the Inland Empire are posted here <link> .

All COE scan reports for California are posted on the COE website <link> .