Maine’s clean energy sector has been one of the state’s better economic stories. The industry employed nearly 16,200 workers in 2024, up 4% year over year and outpacing any other New England state over the preceding four years, according to the state Department of Energy Resources. Solar capacity has expanded from 62 megawatts statewide five years ago to 977 megawatts by the time Maine received its Solar for All federal grant in 2024. The numbers look good on paper. The people who actually do the installations tell a more complicated story.

Yehuda Gittelson, a NABCEP-certified solar installer with Solaris Energy Solutions in Portland, has watched the industry’s hiring side closely enough to have opinions about it. His view is not that there are too few workers interested in solar. His view is that the pipeline between interest and competence is too thin and too inconsistent to support the buildout Maine has committed to.

“People can get into this trade fast,” Gittelson said. “That’s not always a good thing. Fast entry without real training just means more callbacks and more warranty claims later.”

The Certification Gap

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects solar photovoltaic installer positions will grow 48% between 2023 and 2033, a rate that outpaces nearly every other occupation in the country. The solar industry currently supports roughly 280,000 workers nationally. The median pay for a solar PV installer runs about $51,860 per year. Those numbers attract applicants. What they don’t guarantee is that applicants arrive with the technical foundation the work actually requires.

NABCEP, the credentialing organization whose PV Installation Professional exam is widely treated as the industry’s most rigorous benchmark, has certified roughly 18,000 solar professionals across its credential tiers. That figure represents a fraction of the total solar workforce. The gap matters because there is no federal apprenticeship designation for solar installers, meaning there is no uniform national standard for what on-the-job training looks like before a worker touches a client’s roof. Community colleges, trade schools, and unions like the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers have expanded solar training programs, but coverage is uneven across states and regions.

Maine has attempted to address this by investing in its workforce aligned with its renewable energy policy goals. The $62 million Solar for All federal grant the state received in 2024 included funding to support training for more than 700 Maine residents in electrical work, construction, and maintenance trades — before the EPA later moved to terminate the program under new federal direction. The loss of that funding drew pointed responses from state officials who argued that workforce development and solar deployment are inseparable goals.

What Qualified Actually Means

Gittelson draws a distinction that doesn’t always appear in workforce policy discussions: the difference between someone who can install a system and someone who can design, troubleshoot, and stand behind one. His mechanical engineering background from the University of Maine at Orono, combined with two years on wind farm projects in Aroostook County before he joined Solaris, gave him a framework for understanding energy systems rather than just executing installation steps.

That background is not common in the residential solar trade. Most installers come up through construction or electrical work, which provides useful adjacent skills but doesn’t automatically transfer to the specific demands of photovoltaic system design — string sizing, shading analysis, inverter selection, load calculations, and NEC Article 690 compliance. The NABCEP exam tests it all. The experience documentation requirements test whether a candidate has actually encountered these situations in the field, not just read about them.

“There’s a difference between knowing that something is in the code and understanding why it’s there,” Gittelson said. “The why is what helps you when something doesn’t go according to plan on a job site.”

Policy Headwinds

The federal policy environment has added a layer of uncertainty that affects hiring calculus across the industry. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed in July 2025, accelerated the phase-out of wind and solar investment tax credits by five years, with limited exceptions for projects beginning construction before July 2026. In Maine, the effects registered quickly. Unions reported that around 100 jobs were lost in the wake of canceled contracts, and apprenticeship applications dropped roughly 40% compared to prior year figures, according to Local Chapter 1253 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.

For Gittelson and workers in the residential segment, the immediate impact has been more muted. Residential rooftop solar operates on a different economic model than utility-scale development, and Maine’s net energy billing policy continues to make rooftop systems financially attractive for homeowners. The federal residential solar tax credit, which allows homeowners to deduct 30% of system costs through 2032, remains intact under current law. Still, the uncertainty around large-scale projects affects the broader labor market, including training programs that depend on a stable demand signal to justify enrollment and staffing.

Building a Workforce That Lasts

The Operations and Maintenance segment of the solar workforce has grown by 116% nationally over the past five years, driven by the maturing installed base of systems that now require professional servicing. That trend has implications for the development of the trade. A career in solar is no longer primarily about installing solar systems. Systems installed five and ten years ago need inverter replacements, restringing, monitoring diagnostics, and in some cases, roof work tied to panel removal and reinstallation. Workers who understand how a system was designed, not just how it was assembled, are better positioned to service it.

Gittelson tracks continuing education hours through NABCEP’s recertification cycle, which requires documented professional development every three years. He has focused his recent coursework on battery storage integration, an area he expects to define the next phase of residential solar work in Maine. The state committed to a 400-megawatt energy storage procurement goal by 2030, and the intersection of storage and rooftop solar is already reshaping what a standard residential quote looks like.

“The job five years from now is going to look pretty different from what it is today,” Gittelson said. “The installers who stay current on storage and grid integration are going to be the ones still working.”