Join the BlueGreen Alliance
Help us identify ways to turn today’s environmental challenges into job-creating and economic opportunities!We need targeted responses that minimize the pain for workers and communities that have relied economically on technologies with dwindling market demand and that create new economic opportunities and pathways to good-paying, union jobs.
The Challenge
For generations, coal-dependent areas—reliant on coal mining or coal-based electric power generation plants—have built their economies around that resource, not only for the employment of their citizens, but for the revenue that supports their schools, infrastructure, and small businesses. We need targeted responses that minimize the pain for workers and communities that have relied economically on technologies with dwindling market demand and that create new economic opportunities and pathways to good-paying, union jobs.
Because these regions are often geographically isolated and coal facilities are frequently a primary direct and indirect employer of workers across multiple counties, local communities, and their economies undergo harsh and often lasting changes when facilities close. The energy jobs being lost are often good-paying, union jobs. For instance, power plant operators receive an average annual salary around $90,000, while coal miners have an average annual salary over $60,000. On-site management positions typically pay six figures. But it’s not just those workers and their families who are affected. For every direct coal job that has been lost, four other jobs have disappeared in these communities, meaning a quarter of a million jobs already have been lost.
The Opportunity
While there is no policy “silver bullet” that can fully address this transition, reclamation and reclaimed lands have the potential to be reused as sites that spur new economic opportunities and job creation in these communities, while improving the health and safety of these communities.
The National Economic Transition platform, a plan crafted by local, Tribal, and labor leaders, as well as national organizations like the BlueGreen Alliance, offers a blueprint on how to build resilient and equitable economies in the places hardest hit by the evolution of our national energy systems.
Key Facts
250,000 jobs For every one direct coal job that has been lost, four other jobs have disappeared in these communities, meaning a quarter of a million jobs already have been lost. (Source)
$90,000 Power plant operators receive an average annual salary around $90,000. (Source)
Top Five As of 2021, the top five U.S. counties with the highest capacity of coal-fired power were also classified as having economic distress. (Source)