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Workforce Development

Overview of the sector and GHG emissions

Implementing Hawaiʻi’s Climate Action Pathways will require a skilled, local workforce capable of delivering climate solutions across energy, land stewardship, buildings, transportation, water, waste, and public health. Workforce development is therefore a core pillar of Hawaiʻi’s climate strategy, not only to meet emissions reduction and resilience goals, but also to ensure that the jobs created through this transition strengthen local communities and benefit kamaʻāina.
Building a climate-ready workforce in Hawaiʻi means developing talent at home, reducing reliance on imported labor, and creating accessible pathways into stable, meaningful careers. This includes preparing workers for emerging climate-related fields, supporting lifelong learning and reskilling, and aligning education and training programs with real workforce demand across the islands.
Workforce strategies must also recognize and address the real barriers that prevent many residents from participating in climate-related careers. These include cost of living pressures, limited access to training in rural areas, lack of paid learning opportunities, and gaps in culturally relevant education and support. Addressing these challenges requires pairing job training with practical supports and community-rooted approaches that help people not only enter climate careers, but remain in them over time. When done well, workforce development can advance climate action while expanding economic security and long-term resilience across Hawaiʻi.

Workforce Demand and Growth Areas

Climate-related jobs in Hawaiʻi support the systems people rely on every day, including energy, food, housing, transportation, water, waste, public health, and emergency response. As climate impacts intensify and infrastructure investments expand, workforce demand is growing across both emissions reduction and climate resilience efforts.

Growth Beyond Clean Energy

While clean energy remains a major source of job growth, climate workforce demand in Hawaiʻi extends well beyond energy production. Increasing needs are emerging in climate-resilient building construction and retrofits, regenerative agriculture and aquaculture, land and forest management, coastal and watershed protection, disaster preparedness, clean transportation, and waste reduction and circular economy services.

Rising Need for Technical and Applied Skills

Many climate-related roles require a mix of technical expertise and hands-on experience. Demand is increasing for workers with skills in areas such as energy systems, water and wastewater operations, construction trades, environmental monitoring, GIS and data analysis, emergency management, and public health response. These roles often support essential infrastructure and services that must function reliably under changing climate conditions.

Careers That Combine Skills and Service

Climate jobs in Hawaiʻi often blend technical work with planning, coordination, and community-facing responsibilities. Roles in areas such as land stewardship, disaster response, public health, and infrastructure planning require collaboration with residents, local organizations, and public agencies. These roles combine practical skills with service to communities.

Pathways Across Life Stages

Climate workforce demand spans entry-level, mid-career, and advanced professional roles. Opportunities exist for students entering the workforce, adults seeking to reskill, and experienced workers transitioning into climate-aligned fields. Building flexible training and career pathways helps ensure Hawaiʻi can meet workforce needs over time while opening doors for residents at different stages of life.

Key Features of Hawaiʻi's Workforce Landscape

Place-Based and Locally Driven

Climate-related work in Hawaiʻi is deeply place-based. Many roles require knowledge of local ecosystems, island infrastructure, and community needs, from land and watershed management to energy systems and disaster response. This makes locally trained workers essential and limits the effectiveness of relying on short-term or imported labor.

Broad Range of Climate Careers

Climate workforce demand in Hawaiʻi extends well beyond clean energy. Growing fields include regenerative agriculture and aquaculture, climate-resilient construction and retrofits, land and coastal management, water and wastewater systems, waste reduction and circular economy services, disaster preparedness, climate data and GIS, and public health. Many roles blend technical skills with stewardship, planning, and community engagement.

Strong Role of Community and Intermediary Organizations

Community-based organizations, nonprofits, and workforce intermediaries play a central role in Hawaiʻi’s workforce system. These groups often connect residents to training, paid work experience, mentorship, and career navigation, particularly in rural areas and communities with limited access to traditional education pathways. They help bridge gaps between schools, employers, and communities, making workforce pathways more accessible and trusted.

Emphasis on Work-Based Learning

Apprenticeships, pre-apprenticeships, and earn-and-learn models are a defining feature of Hawaiʻi’s climate workforce approach. These models allow people to build skills while earning income, which is critical given the state’s high cost of living. When aligned with real projects and local employers, work-based learning improves job readiness and long-term retention.

Values of Stewardship and Community Benefit

Climate workforce development in Hawaiʻi is increasingly guided by values that emphasize caring for land and water, strengthening self-reliance, and supporting community wellbeing. Frameworks such as ʻĀina Aloha Economic Futures highlight careers that contribute to long-term resilience and reflect community-defined priorities, helping ensure climate work is both meaningful and grounded in place.

Challenges and Opportunities

Workforce Retention and Cost of Living

One of the most significant challenges facing Hawaiʻi’s climate workforce is retaining skilled workers. High housing costs and overall cost of living continue to push trained workers to leave the state, even as demand for climate-related roles grows. This dynamic weakens the long-term return on investments in local training and education.

Opportunities

Strengthening career pathways that lead to stable, well-paying jobs, paired with earn-and-learn models, wage standards, and employer commitments to fair compensation, can help workers remain in Hawaiʻi. Retention can be further supported by providing wraparound services during training and apprenticeships, such as childcare, transportation assistance, stipends, and career navigation, so participants are able to complete programs and transition successfully into long-term employment. Addressing workforce retention also requires recognizing housing affordability as a workforce issue, and better aligning climate workforce investments with efforts to expand access to affordable housing for workers in climate-critical sectors.

Fragmented Training and Career Pathways

Climate-related education and training programs exist across the state, but they are often disconnected across institutions, sectors, and islands. Learners may struggle to move between programs or understand how short-term training connects to long-term careers.

Opportunities

Improving coordination among education providers, workforce organizations, and employers can create clearer, more navigable pathways. Stackable credentials, aligned curricula, and shared planning help reduce dead ends and make it easier for learners to advance over time.

Limited Access to Paid, Hands-On Learning

Many climate careers require practical, hands-on experience, yet unpaid or inflexible training models create barriers for people who cannot afford to pause income or relocate for education. This especially affects adult learners, working families, and residents in rural areas.

Opportunities

Expanding paid work-based learning, apprenticeships, and earn-and-learn programs allows people to build skills while earning income. These models reduce financial barriers, improve job readiness, and support stronger connections between training and employment.

Uneven Access Across Communities

Access to climate-related training and career exposure varies widely by geography and community capacity. Rural areas and communities farther from major education and employment centers often face fewer training options, limited transportation access, and less exposure to climate-related career pathways.

Opportunities

Locating training, job centers, and career navigation services within communities, including through mobile training units and partnerships with community-based organizations, can expand access and reduce geographic and logistical barriers.

Underinvestment in Stewardship and Conservation Careers

Work in conservation, land management, and ecosystem restoration is foundational to Hawaiʻi’s climate resilience, yet these roles are often underpaid and undervalued. Long-term benefits are not always visible, making it harder to sustain investment and attract workers.

Opportunities

Clear communication about the long-term value of stewardship work, combined with skills-based hiring and stronger wage support, can help build a more stable workforce in these essential fields.

Awareness and Visibility of Climate Careers

Many residents, especially youth, associate climate jobs narrowly with clean energy and may not see pathways that align with their interests or strengths.

Opportunities

Expanding early exposure, career exploration, and storytelling that highlights the full range of climate-related work can help people see themselves in Hawaiʻi’s climate future and make informed career choices.

State and County Actions

The workforce recommendations in the Climate Action Pathways focus on strengthening Hawaiʻi’s ability to prepare, support, and retain workers needed to deliver climate solutions across the state. Together, they aim to improve coordination, expand access to training, reduce barriers to participation, and ensure that climate-related careers lead to stable, long-term employment for local residents. Collectively, these recommendations span education, workforce systems, employers, and community partners. They are designed to support workers at different life stages, across islands and regions, and in a wide range of climate-related sectors. Rather than creating entirely new systems, the recommendations focus on strengthening and aligning existing programs, partnerships, and resources to build a durable, locally grounded climate workforce over time.

Strengthening Workforce Coordination

State agencies play an important role in coordinating workforce development across education, training, and employment systems. The Department of Labor and Industrial Relations, Department of Education, and Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism contribute to workforce planning through sector partnerships, career and technical education programs, and labor market analysis that help align training efforts with evolving climate-related workforce needs.

Supporting Sector Partnerships and Intermediaries

The State supports industry sector partnerships that bring together employers, educators, and workforce organizations to identify shared workforce needs and co-design training programs. These partnerships help align curriculum with hiring demand and improve coordination across institutions. Intermediary organizations supported through these efforts help reduce administrative burdens for schools and employers and expand access to work-based learning opportunities across sectors.

Expanding Work-Based Learning and Apprenticeships

State and county agencies contribute to work-based learning through registered apprenticeships, pre-apprenticeships, internships, and earn-and-learn models in climaterelevant fields. Public agencies and utilities can serve as anchor employers by hosting trainees, providing real-world project sites, and offering mentorship tied to ongoing infrastructure, land management, energy, water, and resilience projects.

Aligning Education Pathways with Workforce Demand

The State supports career and technical education and postsecondary pathways that prepare students for in-demand fields connected to climate mitigation and resilience. The Climate Action Pathways highlight opportunities to better align existing education-tocareer pathways with climate-related roles by integrating applied learning, strengthening transfer pathways, and improving coordination between high schools, community colleges, and employers.

County Roles in Place-Based Workforce Development

Counties play a critical role in shaping place-based workforce opportunities through economic development boards, infrastructure planning, and community partnerships. Counties can support climate workforce development by facilitating local training partnerships, hosting work-based learning opportunities, and helping connect residents to projects that address local climate risks such as flooding, wildfire, water management, and coastal impacts.

Improving Access and Participation

State and county efforts increasingly emphasize reducing barriers to participation in workforce programs. This includes partnering with community-based organizations for outreach and training delivery, supporting wraparound services during training and apprenticeships, and exploring mobile or community-based training models that expand access for residents in rural areas and communities with limited training infrastructure.

Participating in National Climate Workforce Efforts

Hawaiʻi participates in national initiatives such as the U.S. Climate Alliance’s ClimateReady Workforce Initiative, contributing to shared learning and supporting the development of new pre-apprenticeship and apprenticeship pathways aligned with climate-related careers. Participation in these efforts helps Hawaiʻi adapt emerging best practices to local workforce needs and conditions.

Measure Description and Scope

MeasureDescriptionMeasure Scope
28. EDUCATION &WORKFORCE
DEVELOPMENT

1. Expand Department of
Education’s Career and
Technical Education
Program for high schools
and Hawaiʻi community
colleges to include more
green jobs and externship
opportunities.
   o Additional staff
positions at DOE focused
on climate and ʻāina
curriculum, and CTE
programs
   o Expand opportunities
and incentives for teacher
training and curriculum
development in green and
climate jobs.

2. Identify skillsets and
pathways needed in
different green job sectors.
3. Integrate stackable
credentials to create career
pathways.

4. Increase paid
apprenticeships, pre-apprenticeship and project-based learning in the
workplace in green job
sectors.

5. Increase capacity at
DLIR to coordinate.

6. Collaboration across
government, communities,
workforce systems, labor
unions, industry,
community-based
organizations, and
educational institutions.

Strengthen the ecosystem
of state, non-profit and
private actors working in
the green jobs and climate education and circular economy space through
supporting initiatives that:• Bring climate education
to schools.
• bridge schools with the
workplace offering project based learning opportunities.

Case Studies

Kupu:

Kupu is a statewide nonprofit that builds career pathways for Hawaiʻi residents through conservation, sustainability, and community-based service. Programs such as the Conservation Leadership Development Program, Kupu ʻĀina Corps, and the Kupu Community Program provide paid, hands-on training in natural resource management, disaster preparedness, energy, and community resilience. Through its Natural Resources Sector Partnership, Kupu works with public agencies, nonprofits, and employers to align training with workforce needs and create pathways into long-term climate-related careers.
ALOHA

ʻEwalu Industries:

ʻEwalu Industries supports workforce development and leadership pathways that strengthen Hawaiʻi’s local economy and future workforce. Through CREATE Hawaiʻi, Lead for Hawaiʻi, the ʻŌpio Internship Program, and the Workforce Advancement Initiative, ʻEwalu connects students, early-career professionals, and mid-career workers to paid training, mentorship, and placement opportunities. These programs focus on building leadership skills, work experience, and sector-specific capacity aligned with Hawaiʻi’s long-term resilience and economic goals

Hawaiian Trades Academy:

The Hawaiian Trades Academy, operated by the Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement, provides culturally grounded workforce training and certification pathways in skilled trades that support Hawaiʻi’s infrastructure and climate resilience. In response to recent disasters, the program has offered free workforce training classes for Maui residents interested in clean-up and rebuild-related jobs, helping connect local workers to immediate recovery needs. These efforts address workforce shortages in construction and related trades while supporting community-led recovery and long-term resilience.
Sequestration

Hawaiʻi Workforce Funders Collaborative:

The Hawaiʻi Workforce Funders Collaborative brings together public agencies, philanthropy, employers, and workforce organizations to align investments and strategies that strengthen Hawaiʻi’s workforce system. Through initiatives such as the Worker Equity Lab, the collaborative supports data-driven analysis of workforce conditions, wage outcomes, and access barriers, helping inform policies and programs that improve job quality and access to training across priority sectors.

Further Actions

For business

Businesses play a critical role in building Hawaiʻi’s climate workforce by creating real opportunities for learning, employment, and advancement.
  • Participate in work-based learning by hosting interns, apprentices, or earn-and-learn participants connected to climate-related projects.
  • Partner with training providers and intermediary organizations to help shape curricula that reflect real hiring needs.
  • Support employee upskilling through flexible schedules, paid training time, or tuition assistance for climate-relevant skills.
  • Commit to fair compensation and clear advancement pathways, especially in climatecritical fields where retention is a challenge.
Explore how procurement, contracting, and hiring practices can expand opportunities for local workers and small Hawaiʻi-based firms.

For individuals

There are many ways for residents at different life stages to engage with Hawaiʻi’s climate workforce.
  • Explore climate-aligned careers across sectors such as energy, construction, land stewardship, water systems, public health, data, and disaster preparedness.
  • Seek out paid training, apprenticeships, or earn-and-learn programs that allow you to build skills while earning income.
  • Connect with community-based organizations and workforce navigators that can help identify training options and career pathways.
  • Consider reskilling or adding new credentials that align with climate resilience work already happening in your field.
  • Share stories and experiences to help raise awareness of the wide range of climate careers available in Hawaiʻi.

For NGOS

Community organizations are essential to connecting people to opportunity and grounding workforce development in local needs.
  • Partner with education providers and employers to deliver training, mentorship, and work-based learning opportunities.
  • Provide or coordinate wraparound services such as transportation support, stipends, childcare referrals, and career navigation to help participants complete programs.
  • Serve as trusted connectors for outreach, especially in rural communities or places with limited access to training institutions.
  • Help design and deliver place-based, culturally grounded programs that align workforce development with stewardship and community priorities.
  • Share lessons learned and successful models to support coordination and reduce duplication across the workforce system.

Resources

State Agencies

County resources

Non-profit organizations

Educational resources and programs