Concern rises over expected labor shortage at power companies

May 18--ALBANY -- By Dan Higgins, Times Union, Albany, N.Y. Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News

The shortage of qualified workers in the U.S. power generation industry is bound to get worse in the next five years, officials said Tuesday.

Industry, education, and political leaders at a round-table discussion at the State Museum said the key to solving the problem is finding ways to interest grade school students in engineering and technical careers as well as finding creative ways to retain experienced workers.

By 2007, the number of power industry jobs will exceed the number of workers, said Elaine Weinstein, senior vice president and chief diversity officer for Brooklyn-based Keyspan Corp., which sells electricity and natural gas.

By 2012, the gap should widen, with about 10,000 power industry jobs more than available workers to fill them, Weinstein said, citing federal Bureau of Labor Statistics projections.

"In a nutshell, we've got a problem," she said.

S.S. "Mani" Venkata, dean of the School of Engineering at Clarkson University in Potsdam, said the image of engineers in this country is one reason young people don't choose that field. "It's not a prestige career ... like law, or business," he said. "People in the U.S. think of it as an applied sciences degree, but it is a professional degree," he said.

He warned that the United States is graduating only 60,000 engineers a year, while China graduates more than 600,000 and India 300,000 from their schools.

The power industry also needs skilled technicians and operators, round-table participants said, and vocational high school programs and community colleges can help fill the gap.

Keyspan's Weinstein said the work force is graying, with 48 the average age for utility employees. At the same time, she said, it's difficult for parents to direct their children toward technical education rather than a four-year degree.

"How many parents are encouraging their kids to be a utility lineman?" she said. "Yet there are people with higher degrees who could have been wonderful trade workers or crafts-people."

Barry Weinberg, president of Fulton-Montgomery Community College, said educators are looking at ways to change how community colleges operate, with a new focus on providing specialized training for high-demand jobs.

The round-table was moderated by Assemblyman Paul Tonko, D-Amsterdam, chairman of the Assembly Committee on Energy. Other participants included Steve Labate, a recruiter for GE Global Research in Niskayuna, and Jim Buhrmaster, president of Scotia-based Buhrmaster Energy Group.

-----

To see more of the Times Union, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.timesunion.com .

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800) 661-2511 (U.S.), (213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com. KSE,