The energy infrastructure of the future, together with the integrated approach of efficient and “circular” systems, cleaner power, and fuel systems provide major opportunities to replace and decarbonise the energy sector and is expected to create more jobs than the fossil fuel equivalent technologies. Preparing people for new careers and empowering users and public buyers in the renewable energy sector, reskilling and upskilling measures are vital for extending the employment benefits of the transition along the value chain and in the wider economy to EU citizens.
TRANSIT (TRANSITion to sustainable future through training and education) is a project funded by the European Union under the program Horizon Europe that aims to provide sustainable training and re-skilling programmes for current and future generations on a multidisciplinary approach to renewable energy. In achieving this, TRANSIT seeks to enable the societal changes that can encompass the high ambitions of deployment and transformation of the energy sector in the following decades through the design and delivering of an overall educational, retraining, and social engagement programme covering different sectoral strategies and stakeholders. In particular, TRANSIT addresses the socioeconomic-environmental aspects and externalities deployment factors for renewable energy by identifying the knowledge gaps comprehensively while retaining current opportunities, creating a future-proof framework educational programme informed by industry-academic collaborations to instill knowledge about the circularity concepts such as recyclable by-design and critical raw materials.
The project seeks to determine the relevant externalities in education that might restrict or promote the broader adoption of renewable energy in our local and global context, encompassing the ‘circularity-by-design’ and addressing the social and environmental aspects through a multidisciplinary cooperation approach by experts and stakeholders; to evaluate the TRANSIT development of supporting activities in renewable energy educational approaches and sustainable aspects towards an enhanced social acceptance and gender balance; to set up and initiate an open access structured programme to promote an innovative multidisciplinary approach to teaching, engaging with the sustainability of all forms of renewable energy and emerging energy thematics; to deliver an industry-academia hands-on training programme, developing human capital, supporting education, revamping and reskilling efforts in renewable energy and to raise awareness, honor exemplars, collaborate with relevant projects, promote TRANSIT supporting activities and resources and disseminate results, including long-term exploitation and wider understanding of renewable energy sustainability aspects.
TRANSIT’s expected outcomes support sustainability, renewable energy environmental, social, and economic acceptance through dedicated target groups’ educational materials, covering the various sectorial strategies under the European Green Deal. This approach includes cataloging educational success stories to be retained and promoted and developing multidisciplinary approach educational programmes, from educational campaigns to hands-on
courses. Validation of TRANSIT educational material will pass through rigorous quality assurance that each material also considers gender balance, societal impact, life cycles, and substitution of fossil fuels. The validation of the
programme developed will ensure post-project life is addressed through scalability and replicability TRANSIT solutions, including the deployment of the programme in partner countries through appropriate stakeholders and open
access practices. Experts from social sciences and humanities work closely with the engineers of renewable energy to create project material in a language understandable and the level applicable to a wide range of society and stakeholders.
