While the Twin Cities metro area holds the majority of Minnesota's energy jobs, Greater Minnesota is now outpacing the metro in clean energy job growth, according to /deed/newscenter/publications/trends/december-2024/green.jsprecent analysis by DEED's Molly Ingram. Does this signal a huge emerging opportunity for the Northwest Minnesota workforce? If so, increased workforce development investment would be warranted. This review of information on wind and solar electricity generation and related employment in Northwest Minnesota suggests the magnitude of employment does not warrant this, at least not yet, but stay tuned for a future blog on the greater workforce opportunity of energy efficiency.

Ingram's third article in a series on workforce considerations of Minnesota's Climate Action Framework states, "changes in power generation and fuel technologies associated with energy jobs in Greater Minnesota are likely here to stay for the foreseeable future." Indeed, power generation technology is changing, and this change is largely shaped by clean energy goals. The Minnesota Department of Commerce reports that over the next ten years the share of Minnesota's electricity from wind is predicted to increase from 25% to 51% (more than doubling), and from solar to increase from 4% to 13% (more than tripling).

In the meantime, electricity demand is predicted to increase 5% over the next 15 years. Meeting increased electricity demand with a different mix of generation technology would mean shifting energy sector employment. And there appears to be shifting below the surface in Northwest Minnesota's Electric Power Generation, Transmission and Distribution industry group. There were 1,183 jobs in 2023, which was little changed from the 1,179 jobs recorded in 2019, even while the Hoot Lake coal-fired power plant in Fergus Falls was retired after 100 years in 2021. Otter Tail Power Company reported that the generation capacity was replaced with natural gas and wind facilities.

So far, we've seen most wind energy located in southern Minnesota. That's not to say the Northwest is completely left out. According to the Clean Grid Alliance (CGA), eleven of the 127 grid-coupled wind generation plants that came online since 1997 are in the Northwest Region. These have a combined capacity of 85 megawatts (MW), amounting to about 1.8% of the 4,677 MW statewide wind generation capacity. The most recent Northwest wind plant was added in 2020 with 4.6 MW capacity. This is one of the total ten statewide wind generating plants coming online since 2019, but amounts to merely 0.2% of statewide added capacity. So, the Northwest has not been catching up in wind generation since 2019. With nearly 75% of Minnesota's total wind generating capacity located in the Southwest and an additional 20% in the Southeast, the rest of Minnesota – including the Northwest – is not a big player in wind generation.

Solar plants are more recent additions to Minnesota's generating mix, with the first project recorded by CGA in 2013. Up to the most recent in 2024, there have been a total of 482 solar projects statewide for a combined 1,480 MW capacity. The Northwest has 34 of these, for a combined capacity of 114 MW, amounting to 7.7% of statewide solar capacity. However, looking at the solar added since 2019, the Northwest contributes nearly 15% of Minnesota's added solar capacity with 21 of the 216 plants added and 83 of the of the 558 MW added. While the Northwest is growing its share, Central Minnesota is the big player with over 50% of the state's solar capacity, and 58% of Minnesota's capacity added since 2019.

So what sort of employment impact is wind and solar power generation having in the Northwest? The US Department of Energy has been answering this for all energy technologies nationwide with the United States Energy and Employment Report (USEER). It estimates the number of jobs associated with each energy technology. While some county level estimates are supplied, most counties have less than 10 estimated jobs and are reported as "< 10." Therefore, estimating jobs for sub-state regions is not possible. Still, the available county data are informative.

For wind generation in 2023, there were an estimated 15 jobs associated with wind generation in Douglas and 27 in Todd. All the rest of the Northwest Minnesota counties were reported as "< 10." Furthermore, USEER estimates 2,860 statewide wind-related jobs in 2023. That is about 0.6 jobs per MW of wind capacity statewide. If Northwest Minnesota's jobs per MW scale about the same, one would expect 52 jobs (85 MW times 0.6 jobs per MW). That is only 11 more than estimated for Douglas and Todd. So, it is reasonable to assume there is not a massive number of additional wind-related jobs in the rest of Northwest Minnesota's counties that each are estimated to have less than ten jobs.

USEER also informs us that nationwide 8% of wind-related jobs are in Manufacturing and 11% are in Wholesale Trade, reflecting the supply chain for this technology. These jobs would be geographically concentrated based on where components are manufactured. Since Minnesota is not known for wind power component manufacturing, I do not expect a concentration here.

Construction accounts for the largest share of U.S. wind-related jobs, at 35%, while 27% are in Professional and Business Services which includes civil engineering firms. This indicates significant front-loading of employment in constructing wind projects. Only 8% of the U.S. employment is in Utilities, which is the industry most associated with ongoing operation. Thus, like most heavy and civil engineering projects, many workers can be expected to come from other places for the duration of the project and then leave when it is completed. With only about 9% of Minnesota's wind projects built in the Northwest, there is a limited need for a resident wind energy workforce.

Even though solar is a bigger part of the Northwest's electric generation mix than wind, USEER has "< 10" jobs for all but one Northwest county. Cass County has an estimated 22 solar-power-related jobs in 2023. According to CGA, Minnesota Power's 15 MW Sylvan Solar Project came online in Cass County in 2023. In 2024, the much smaller Spring Prairie Community Solar Garden also came online in Cass county. Since these are the only Northwest grid-coupled solar projects since 2021, this could explain Cass County's sole appearance in the USEER data.

Statewide, USEER estimates 5,332 solar-power-related jobs, 86% more than for wind. Nationwide, there is also a slightly smaller share than for wind in Manufacturing (13%), Wholesale Trade (8%), and Professional and Business Services (16%), while half of the jobs are in Construction. So, it is reasonable to suspect there may be significant solar-related employment in Northwest Minnesota counties besides Cass County, even with less than ten per county estimated by USEER.

DEED's /deed/data/current-econ-highlights/qcew-econ-highlights.jspQuarterly Census of Employment and Wages data shows in 2023 there were 219 Electrical Contractor firms with 1,173 jobs in Northwest Minnesota, for an average of about five jobs per firm. If even a third of Northwest Minnesota counties had an electrical contractor doing solar installations with five employees, that would bump solar-related employment up by an additional 45 jobs. However, like for wind, this is not a staggering number of solar-related jobs. It also might be worth noting that the Clean Energy Resource Teams (CERTs) Solar Business Directory lists only two solar installers based in Northwest Minnesota (Real Solar, based in Cass County and Winkelman Solar in Crow Wing County). The CERTs list is not intended to be exhaustive, but businesses would want to get promoted there.

The conclusion from this effort to systematically apply the available regional data and information on wind and solar generation employment is that there does not yet appear to be a massive number of jobs in Northwest Minnesota. That lessens the call for workforce development initiatives. Granted, the data are spotty. So much so that applying the data did not encourage a single table or figure – unheard of for a Regional Spotlight. However, if the jobs were available, we would expect to see this in the CGA grid-coupled power projects and the USEER data.

As Ingram writes, "...the first thing that comes to mind is likely...visions of solar panels and wind turbines." However, "The energy efficiency sector alone accounts for about 75% of all clean energy jobs...". Here is where I expect a more compelling workforce opportunity.

For more information about energy employment in Northwest Minnesota, contact Anthony Schaffhauser at Anthony.schaffhauser@state.mn.us or visit CareerForceMN's Find a Job.