It would be interesting to get an in general idea of careers that you feel are compatible with solarpunk ethos. also asking for myself haha I live in a city. thanks!
Lots of options. Lets start with a simple one: Bicycle repair shop.
Hell yeah.
Librarian!
E-bike repair and sales.
Electrician, as household remove gas appliances, they will be switching to electricity. Any building trade, actually. There are going to be a lot of houses and buildings that will upgrading to be more green, and as climate effects will be stronger, houses will have to be built stronger to withstand a more angry mother Nature, and more insulated.
Given the number of houses that will be needed to replace what we have, this will be a boom industry for years. Factory built houses that are field assembled is one area that could be high growth. I expect 3D printed houses, and underground houses to be a trend, too.
Solar Installer or Wind turbine installer. Manager or project manager at companies that do solar or wind power installations.
Artist who builds sculptures out of scrap metal and/or trash or recycled objects.
An updated version of ‘junk yard owner’, possibly refurbishing or otherwise breathing new life into objects that would normally be trashed, and selling them to new owners.
I work as a field service engineer for Agilent, and I like it a lot. The day-to-day work is enjoyable, and it has a lot of quirks that I think solarpunk folks would appreciate.
One is that I travel each day to different laboratories, and see a lot of different operations from the inside. I like that it offers me opportunities to work with really advanced robotics and see the inside of complex factories and such. Obviously, it’s a component of some industries I have complaints with. Many of our customers are big pharma companies, for instance. But and I don’t feel complicit in causing harm the way I would if i were part of the fossil fuel supply chain, since I don’t think pharma research is the problem, but the financial structure of the industry. Helping people do research doesn’t feel dirty to me. And I also get to see places working on regenerative farming and plant-based protein foods.
Class-wise, it’s an interesting and somewhat rare hybrid of blue-collar physical work with the culture and pay of white collar work, and I find it influential that it models this kind of cross-class dynamic that I think should be more common. More blue collar workers SHOULD have control over their schedules and get paid well; and I think more people with degrees would like to work with their hands.
It’s an unusual job, but there’s a lot about it that I think would appeal to people in this community.
Almost any job that currently exists with a focus on sustainability and recycling. Lots of tech, bio jobs. Also artists and farmers Architects etc.
It needs to be a cultural shift for existing jobs away from profit insentivised goals and instead towards the sustainability of society, culture and nature.
The better question would be what jobs are not needed in a solarpunk future.
