INDIANAPOLIS — The number of Hoosiers employed in clean energy continues to go up as the workforce recovers from the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new report.
Even more clean energy jobs are expected to go online as Indiana continues its transition to cleaner energy sources and away from coal.
The eighth annual Clean Jobs America 2023 report published by the San Francisco-based business group Environmental Entrepreneurs, or E2, shows that every state added clean energy jobs in 2022. Clean energy jobs in Indiana grew about 3.7% from 85,298 in 2021 to over 88,400 in 2022. Fossil fuel-related work, meanwhile, accounted for just 14,837 jobs.
This growth sets the stage before the sector sees a boost from historic federal investment in climate and clean energy. Major new clean energy projects announced by companies in the first year since the Inflation Reduction Act was signed into law in August 2022 totaled 210 across 38 states.
Seven of those projects are in Indiana, including the new Bila Solar plant and headquarters in Indianapolis, the Entek lithium battery separator plant in Terre Haute, and an expansion of General Motors’ Marion operations to support electric vehicle production. The projects are expected to create more than 1,400 new jobs and amount to more than $2.4 billion in investment.
Every clean energy sector in Indiana added jobs in 2022 according to Clean Jobs America. The Indianapolis-Carmel-Anderson metropolitan areas led all metros for the most clean energy jobs, with more than 28,000 jobs.
Marion, Elkhart, Allen, Lake, Hamilton, and St. Joseph led all counties for the most clean energy jobs with at least 3,000 jobs in each. Bartholomew, Clark, Decatur, Gibson, Hendricks, Howard, Johnson, Monroe, Noble, Porter, Shelby, Tippecanoe, and Vanderburgh counties followed with at least 1,000 clean energy jobs.
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