A new report has found that over a third of APAC energy workers report having repeated training, certification or assessment for roles where they already had relevant experience when moving between sectors, employers, projects or regions.
During an energy workforce crisis, the barriers between workers and moving into the green jobs gap should be little to none, yet repeated training and undiscovered overlapping skills are slowing progress.
OPITO’s ‘One safety vision’ report is calling for industries to map overlapping skills and competencies, while retaining training requirements specific to each working environment, after surveying 390 workers across the APAC region.
APAC’s energy industry is renowned as a global powerhouse. It accounts for nearly half of the world’s primary energy consumption and is home to roughly 60% of the global population, with its power market having reached 4.62 terawatts (TW) in 2025 and projected to grow to 6.20 TW by 2030.
With such a promising pipeline of growth, the survey confirms growing appetite for cross-sector talent transfer, with 53% of employers likely to consider using workers from adjacent safety-critical sectors if it becomes harder to find skills and the same proportion of workers willing to consider working in other safety-critical sectors.
However, this is not matched by confidence in transferable skills. Among workers who say they are unlikely to move into an adjacent safety-critical sector, 59% cite uncertainty over whether their training would be recognised as one of the main reasons.
Stephen Marcos Jones, CEO at OPITO, said: “As sectors like renewables and oil and gas converge around tomorrow’s integrated energy systems, there is an opportunity for a mutual exchange of knowledge and skills for the benefit of all.
“Yet workers need to know that their experience will be recognised when they work across countries or industries, and employers need confidence that safety standards will be consistent across more diverse workforces.”
Among employers and operators open to hiring or deploying workers from adjacent sectors, 54% say practical competence assessments would give them confidence to do so. The industry perhaps needs a new system, in which there are mapped overlaps in skills, making hiring and training a smoother journey and therefore also the energy transition.
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