Gobs of green jobs: make a living. Help the planet

Career World, April-May, 2008 by Kirsten Weir

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Global warming ... endangered species ... the loss of rain forests--we hear a lot about the gloomy problems facing our planet. It's often hard to know how to help. Fortunately, it's becoming easier than ever to find a career that benefits the environment.

Green careers are those that directly help the environment. And people to do green jobs are in demand, says Kevin Doyle, president of the environmental consulting firm Green Economy. According to Doyle, the U.S. green industry has been growing 5 percent each year over the past three years. In 2005, 1.6 million people worked in environmental jobs. That number doesn't include the growing number of organic farmers. (See "Eat Your Greens," page 12.)

The number of green career options is sure to grow even more as we adapt to our changing world. "The effort to respond to the desire for a cleaner, greener world generates jobs," Doyle told Career World. That's good news for the future workforce--and for the planet.

Use, But Don't Destroy

Many green jobs involve managing limited natural resources, including the air, water, land, and creatures that live there. Green workers often promote sustainable ways of utilizing resources. Sustainable practices draw on the products of nature in a way that won't permanently destroy them for future use.

Water resource managers, for example, make safe water available. They supervise water treatment plants and come up with effective ways to get the water to communities. Foresters manage the way people use forests, so that trees can be harvested to produce paper and wood products in a sustainable way.

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Environmental protection technicians test water, air, and soil for contaminants to keep people and wildlife safe from toxins. Recycling specialists find safe, environmentally healthy ways to dispose of the waste people create.

Park rangers work to maintain healthy habitats in parks or nature preserves. They might spend their time restoring wetlands, removing foreign plant species, or monitoring populations of wildlife. Conservation biologists use science to understand and prevent the threats faced by wild species and their habitats.

The Economy of the Future

Most scientists and environmentalists believe that the biggest threat to the planet is climate change. The energy to run most cars, homes, and businesses comes from burning fossil fuels, such as oil and natural gas. Burning fossil fuels has a downside, though. The process releases carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. The gases build up in Earth's atmosphere, causing the planet to heat up.

Scientists predict that if Earth keeps warming, the planet will undergo big changes. The sea level will rise, many plants and animals will die out, and we'll experience stronger hurricanes, floods, and droughts. It sounds scary, but it doesn't have to happen that way. "Rather than viewing [greenhouse gas] emissions as a problem to be solved, you can view it as an opportunity to utterly transform the way we go about our lives," Doyle says.

According to Doyle, the green job sector that's growing fastest is one he calls "sustainable economy careers." The people in those jobs, he says, are trying to reinvent the industries of our society so people can live comfortable lives while protecting the delicate planet.

All kinds of jobs fall under the category of "sustainable economy." Alternative energy specialists, for example, are needed to design energy sources, such as solar and wind power generators, which provide energy without spewing greenhouse gases. Other engineers are working to design cars and trucks with lower greenhouse gas emissions.

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Another career field that's expanding t fast is green building. Green architects design homes and buildings that create less pollution and use fewer resources, such as electricity. "The building industry is responsible for 40 percent of the [country's] greenhouse gas emissions," says Nellie Reid, a green architect for the architecture firm Gensler.

"Rethinking the way we design buildings, we have a great opportunity to reduce [the] impact on the environment," Reid told Career World. "I think there's a huge demand for people coming into the industry working toward this goal."

It's not only architects who will make a difference in constructing better buildings, Doyle notes. "The people who can do this will be construction workers, carpenters, air-conditioning technicians, the people who install solar panels, and so on," he says. "There is a huge demand for people with those skills."

Help Wanted: Job Unknown

All those jobs make up just a tiny handful of the hundreds of green careers that will be available nationwide in the years to come. In fact, says Doyle, many of the green jobs of the future probably don't even exist today. "We need to invent entirely new technologies that haven't been dreamed of yet," he says. That means there will be lots of future opportunities for people who like to invent things and solve problems.