The Tennessee Valley Authority’s (TVA) Sequoyah nuclear plant is undergoing a scheduled refueling and maintenance outage, and leaders are emphasizing a need for skilled workers.
TVA’s Sequoyah Nuclear Plant Unit 2 began the outage on Friday, October 2, following a 470-day operational cycle that generated “more than 12.3 billion kilowatt-hours of carbon-free energy.”
The plant has approximately 750 full-time employees who are currently working alongside about 1,100 contract workers to complete more than 11,000 planned activities related to the maintenance and refueling outage.
Those contract workers could come from anywhere across the U.S. Many of them are highly skilled nuclear workers who perform outage work nationwide.
However, TVA leaders say they are in need of skilled workers, as are other trade-related industries.
TVA spokesperson Scott Fiedler says as the region continues to grow and as businesses expand or relocate to the area, there is a higher need for trade-related job workers.
“The strength of American energy isn’t measured only in megawatts – it’s measured in people. Energy dominance, grid reliability, and national competitiveness all depend on building and sustaining a skilled workforce,” Fiedler said.
He says that there could be an estimated shortage of 2.1 million manufacturing workers by 2030, along with a welder shortage of about 360,000 workers by 2027.
Fiedler says there is a need for more than 430,000 construction workers, and there is a high demand for electricians, lineworkers and technicians.
He adds that there are more than 500,000 annual openings for skilled trades jobs and only about 26,000 new workers, citing the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
TVA encourages the public to pursue trade jobs and says the State of Tennessee and unions offer training programs, with some jobs paying upwards of $100,000.
“Bottom line – Without skilled workers, there is no American energy dominance,” Fiedler stated.