Paper short abstract:

This paper problematizes the proclaimed “re/up-skilling” of labor on decarbonizing regions, by looking at the gendered realities of “green jobs” in solar megaprojects in Greece.

Paper long abstract:

Skill is not some objective form of knowledge but a result of struggle over socially recognizable knowledge. It is all about social worth and as such it creates categories and hierarchies within a specific labor process. This paper explores the “re/up-skilling” of labor in the main coal-dependent region of Greece (Kozani), navigating a contradictory and violent restructuring of its productive base. With decarbonization implying an estimated loss of thousands of direct and indirect jobs, this district became a target area of Just Transition Fund: EU’s redistributive mechanism promising greener, but also more equal, labor markets through financing both green investments and educational actions of human capital. In the anticipation of becoming a green-hydrogen hub and an industrial cluster of lithium-battery production, Kozani became the epicenter of renewable energy investments (mega solar and wind parks) from global energy firms and hedge funds, taking advantage of fast-track (green-grab) regulations, tax incentives and “cheap nature.” Based on ethnographic fieldwork in 2022 and 2023, I explore the “economy of green certificates,” built around reskilling imaginaries and funds, and the materialized promises of ecomodernist politics, namely green jobs in solar parks. By looking at male precarious construction work in photovoltaics and female agricultural labor in an ESG Investing project, it seems that, rather than upskilling, the proclaimed “preservation of the energy identity” of the region translates to deskilling gendered processes, unable to tackle the pre-existing inequalities of local labor markets and curb the skyrocketing outmigration.