Kicking Off a New Chapter for Solar Workforce Training

The first pilot training for the Solar Training Standards Initiative has been completed at Pearce training facility in Dallas, Texas, USA. This marks a major milestone in the partnership established between the Global Solar Council (GSC) and GWO to develop globally recognised, safety-critical training for the solar PV sector—building on GWO’s proven legacy in the renewables industry training.

Standardising skills across the renewables workforce

GWO’s training project managers joined the Pearce training team who piloted all modules of the new standards, which are carefully tailored to the needs of the solar industry, covering the following areas:

• GWO Solar Safety Training

• GWO Solar Technical Training

Reflecting on the pilot, Peter Wiingaard, Training Project Manager at GWO, remarked:

This pilot at Pearce demonstrates the enormous potential of breaking down barriers between solar and wind training. Integrated skill standardisation across the renewable energy sector can create a flexible workforce, alleviate bottlenecks and contribute significantly to the renewable energy transition.

Thomas Redmond, Training Project Manager at GWO, added:

Pearce has showcased how these new standards support GWO training providers to leverage their experience and existing training infrastructure to deliver training designed especially for the solar sector. It is remarkable to see the seamless transition of standardised training to support our sister sector in solar PV.

The insights gathered during this pilot will help refine and finalise the standards ahead of global launch—ensuring they meet the real-world needs of the solar industry.

What comes next?

Following the successful North America pilot, the GWO team returns to Europe to conduct further pilots in the UK. Lessons learned through pilot testing will allow the expert workgroup to finalise the solar standards content and prepare them for implementation and adoption by the GWO certified training community. The result will be a globally recognised training standard designed to support safe operations and workforce development across the solar industry worldwide.