Supporting UK skills and jobs
Shell UK aims to help 15,000 people into jobs with a focus on the energy transition by 2035. SkillsTransition invests in programmes that help to upskill, reskill and empower a new generation of energy professionals.
In 2025, 80.85% of Shell’s global investments included oil & gas, 9.58% included low-carbon energy solutions and 9.58% non-energy products. Shell’s target is to become a net-zero emissions (NZE) energy business by 2050. Disclaimers, including NZE target: shell.com/disclaimer.
The challenge
The UK’s journey to net zero is likely to create significant economic and career opportunities for the country. But without the right investment, skills, and access to jobs, there is a risk of leaving people behind.
It is estimated that 1 in 5 jobs will experience a shift in demand for skills through the transition to net zero, with around 3 million workers needing some form of reskilling1.
Our role in the energy transition
To help close this skills gap, Shell UK aims to support 15,000 people into jobs with a focus on the energy transition by 2035. We are doing this by working with partners across the UK to fund and deliver initiatives led by further education colleges, charities, skills bodies and other organisations. These programmes help people develop core employability and energy specific skills needed to progress into meaningful work.
Shell UK's SkillsTransition programme aims to help 15,000 people into jobs with a focus on the energy transition by 2035.
By the end of 2026, more than 10,000 people are expected to have engaged with SkillsTransition programmes building a strong pipeline into jobs.
1 DESNZ, Clean Power 2030 Action Plan: Assessment of the clean energy skills challenge (2025)
Energy Transition Skills Hubs
Energy Transition Skills Hubs, supported by Shell UK, provide teaching space and equipment demonstrating the latest energy technologies. The hubs across the UK provide students with the opportunity to learn and refine critical industry skills. These include welding and fabrication workshops, virtual control room facilities and lessons in nano grid design technology.
The Pembrokeshire and Fife Energy Transition Skills Hubs opened to students in Autumn 2024, while the Aberdeen Energy Transition Skills Hub opened in September 2025.
Shell UK has opened 3 Energy Transition Skills Hubs to support around 5,000 learners.
Fife College
Focus: renewable energy technologies, including SmartGrids, solar photovoltaics and wind turbine installation and maintenance and digital and data skills for energy.
Pembrokeshire College
Focus: innovative new control system simulations, including Hydrogen Electrolyser, Solar, Tidal and Offshore Floating Wind systems.
North East Scotland College
Focus: future technologies. Courses on welding, fabrication, engineering skills for future technologies including carbon capture and storage and wind turbine construction.
Pembrokeshire Energy Transition Skills Hub
The hub at Pembrokeshire College in Haverfordwest, offers a new virtual control room centre on the existing campus. This innovative specialist centre provides immersive, hands-on training in control systems crucial for offshore floating wind, hydrogen production, solar photovoltaics and other emerging energy technologies. City and Guilds have developed an assured programme which rewards learners with a digital badge on completion. The training centre is available for school leavers, apprentices, existing energy professionals looking to upskill, and local businesses in need of a highly trained workforce. The facility also offers outreach programmes for schools and the wider community, raising awareness of energy transition and inspiring the next generation of engineers and energy professionals.
Fife Energy Transition Skills Hub
The Energy Transition Hub at Fife College provides students with an immersive learning environment.
Through hands-on delivery, the Fife Hub provides opportunities for students to gain practical skills in renewable technologies, including SmartGrids, wind energy, EV and solar PV systems.
Students learn about installation and maintenance of renewable systems, as well as digital and data skills for energy.
Later this year, a Nanogrid will be installed, complete with small scale solar panels, wind turbines, sensors and associated software. The planned Nanogrid forms part of SkillStreet, a brand-new facility at Dunfermline City Campus. Skills Street brings together industry led projects including those in Net Zero, energy efficiency, retrofit and wider related skills such as geospatial and data science.
Aberdeen Energy Transition Skills Hub
The Energy Transition Skills Hub was founded by ETZ Ltd, Shell UK and North East Scotland College, with support from the Scottish Government’s Just Transition Fund and UK Government funding. Adura is the lead industry partner. The hub significantly increases the capacity of the existing training facilities for fabrication skills on the existing campus at North East Scotland College and provides a flexible space able to adapt to the skills requirements of the future.
The Hub is built on the site of a disused industrial site next to the college as an extension to the existing campus. The new building has quadrupled the welding capacity of the existing training facilities at the college.
The hub aims to contribute to a just and inclusive energy transition by making a positive social impact on communities. It does this by creating flexible training pathways, removing barriers to access to allow for upskilling and reskilling courses. There is also an outreach programme to get schools involved and inspire the next generation. A mobile classroom staffed with an outreach worker and equipped with interactive technology visits local schools aiming to inspire the next generation about the energy transition.
Video transcript
Video transcript
Title: Energy transition skills hubs
Duration: 0.50 minutes
Description: The video shows the 3 new hubs which have been created by Shell to support the UK to train and upskill for jobs which are needed in the energy transition
[Background music plays]
The music is played throughout the whole video which is bright and uplifting with the shell mnemonic played when the pecten appears at the end.
[Visuals]
The video starts by showing an aerial view of a city. Then 2 other cities appear zooming in from the left and the right to show Pembrokeshire, Fife and Aberdeen all in three columns. The Shell pecten which is glowing appears in the center where the text appears.
[Text displays]
Across the UK
[Visuals]
A full screen render of the energy transition skills hub appears showing where the training will take place. It then transitions to show the S-Zero 1 render of another college with students outside.
[Text displays]
work is underway on a series of energy transition skills hubs
[Visuals]
The video shows two students in one of the teaching facilities. They are using one of the machines in the teaching facility. The video transitions to a student in a classroom with a teacher standing over him. He is using some electrical equipment, putting wire together.
[Text displays]
These will include teaching facilities
[Visuals]
The video shows a solar farm, with numerous solar panels. There are three people walking alongside the solar panels with high-vis and hard hats on.
[Text displays]
aiming to prepare people for jobs focused on the energy transition
[Visuals]
The video shows people within a learning facility. There is a teacher in the front who is explaining something to the students who are standing around him. All are wearing blue boiler suits and and protective glasses.
[Text displays]
The hubs will provide specialist equipment and training space
[Visuals]
The video shows a man who is sitting in front of a couple of computers. The computers are showing schematics of solar panels. The footage is in a curved frame which slowly moves from the center of the frame to the left. A new video appears from the right in a smaller curved frame box showing a woman standing in front of a wind turbine looking at her tablet with a hard hat on. Both of those images appear on a split screen. The video of the women moves up to the top of the frame to create space for a 3rd video. This image has two men in hard hats and goggles working on some scaffolding.
[Text displays]
Developing skills that support future energy technologies
[Visuals]
The video shows a man in protective gear who is using a machine to melt metal. The man is working on a single part of the metal but the metal is shown curling around the building in the rest of the frame.
[Text displays]
Like welding and fabrication
[Visuals]
The video shows a close up of a black digital screen which has blue and orange lines interacting with each other and are pulsing.
[Text displays]
electrical and data engineering
[Visuals]
The video shows a close up of a woman's hands which are typing on a computer keyboard.
[Text displays]
and virtual control systems operations
[Visuals]
The video shows two women walking towards the camera. They are talking to each other as they walk. The women are dressed in Shell red boiler suits with yellow Shell hard hats on and protective equipment. They are in an industrial site with pipes around them. The video then transitions into a close up of 2 people. One of them is using a screwdriver to tighten a nail in. The other is opposite watching them.
[Text displays]
It’s part of Shell UK’s ambition to support 15,000 people into jobs
[Visuals]
The video shows offshore wind turbines which are in use. The sky is slowly setting in the background.
[Text displays]
with a focus on the energy transition by 2035
[Visuals]
The video shows a close up of a man looking straight down the camera in a classroom. The man is smiling. The video transitions to a close up of a woman's face. She is smiling largely down to the camera. The video transitions again to a different man looking down to camera. He is smiling brightly as he starts to cross his arms together.
[Text displays]
Helping ensure the energy transition is an opportunity for everyone
[Visuals]
The video of the man crossing his arms disappears to show a white screen. The Shell pecten appears extremely small on the center of the screen and slowly grows changing colours from red to orange. It eventually peels out to show the full size Shell pecten.
[Text displays]
#PoweringProgress
[Visuals]
The video shows disclaimer text which fills the whole screen.
Some of the programmes we are supporting
Discover some of the organisations we are supporting to develop core employability and energy specific skills programmes.
Energise
Shell UK has partnered with Catch22, a charity and social business to found the award-winning “Energise” programme. This is a four-week employability skills programme, with a focus on the energy transition and supporting people into jobs. The programme recruits people from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds and equips them with confidence, awareness and employability support to access careers in the energy transition. In two years, Energise has supported nearly 4,000 learners across London, Essex, Norfolk, Suffolk, Manchester and Liverpool - many reporting significant improvements in their confidence and mental health. Over 1,000 people have been helped into jobs so far, 65% of them remaining in employment beyond 6 months.
Energy and Net-Zero Springboard
upReach is a social mobility charity supporting undergraduates from lower socio-economic backgrounds to access and sustain highly-skilled graduate jobs. Shell UK has worked with upReach to launch the first “Energy and Net Zero programme” which supports 340 undergraduates looking for jobs in energy-related sectors.
PowerUp
Shaw Trust is a leading employment charity helping people gain and sustain jobs, providing training for career progression, and championing community health and wellbeing. They offer tailored programmes to support people in upskilling, retraining and accessing new opportunities to drive positive employment outcomes. Shell UK is working with Shaw Trust on the “PowerUp” programme: short,online employability courses to support diverse groups with soft skills around getting into work, while giving them an insight to jobs in the energy sector. The PowerUp programme has already engaged over 700 people on skills programmes across the UK, particularly in the West Midlands.
The Net Zero Careers Accelerator
GoodPeople are a social enterprise connecting local communities to meaningful employment by partnering with public, private, and not-for-profit sectors to deliver place-based social value programmes. Their flagship Net Zero Careers Accelerator (NZCA) service, with Shell UK as Founding Partner, supports local residents to gain the skills and opportunities to secure roles in the rapidly growing energy efficiency, renewable energy, sustainable transport and natural resource management sectors. Shell UK is working with NZCA to collaborate with housing associations, local authorities and businesses to unlock jobs, and find suitable candidates through partnerships with educational institutions and community partners. Since 2024, the NZCA has helped more than 300 people find jobs in energy and net zero. The aim is to increase this to 800 people by 2028.
Domestic EV retraining
City & Guilds is working with Shell UK to increase the number of electricians in the country who have been trained to safely design, install and maintain domestic, small commercial EVC installations. This is through the City & Guilds Ofqual accredited qualifications, designed in partnership with industry and delivered through further education colleges and training providers. This programme has already trained 250 electricians since 2025 and due to its success has been extended for an additional 12-month period, during which a further 250 electricians will receive industry-designed training in domestic EVC installation.
Girls in Energy
Shell UK founded the Girls in Energy programme and supported its growth for over 15 years, inspiring females to explore careers in STEM and the energy sector.
Delivered with North East Scotland College and Fife College, the year-long course combines learning, industry visits and hands-on workshops, leading to a National 5 Skills for Work Energy qualification.
Today, the programme continues in the North East of Scotland under Adura’s leadership, while Shell UK continues to support delivery in Fife.
Projects we have supported
Powering Refugee Employment - Energy Skills Transition Programme
Breaking Barriers is a specialist refugee employment charity that support refugees into meaningful employment with advice and guidance, education, and training; helping people find financial independence, purpose, and identity through work. Shell UK has worked with Breaking Barriers to launch the Powering Refugee Employment programme, to support around 300 refugees into employment, education, or training across the UK.
Data For Energy Skills Accelerator
Shell UK was the founding supporter of an intensive eight-week online learning programme that teaches sought-after data skills for free. Shell UK funded an 18-month project with FastFutures to deliver a job support programme, teaching data and workplace skills, with a focus on the energy transition. The programme provided learners with the opportunity to achieve a Power BI certificate and was targeted towards individuals from diverse backgrounds.
Sustainability Project Officer
Generation UK is a charity with a mission to support people from disadvantaged backgrounds into sustained employment. With Shell UK's support Generation UK delivered home energy efficiency qualifications through short intensive training programmes. Participants across the UK received wrap-around support and mentoring. Qualified retrofit advisors provide independent advice to homeowners regarding energy efficiency measures. This is a crucial sector in the energy transition as the UK moves towards home decarbonisation.
Naomi Hulston, Chief Executive Officer, Catch22“Through our partnership with Shell UK, we’re able to shape a curriculum that not only builds the confidence of participants, but also equips them with the core skills needed to secure jobs in the sector. The insight that Shell volunteers bring both to the programme development and through insight sessions to participants is invaluable.”
Supporting startups and entrepreneurs
Shell StartUp Engine UK
Shell StartUp Engine UK was launched in 2020 as an acceleration programme designed to boost energy startups in smart sectors like hydrogen, carbon capture, and EV charging, offering mentorship, skills, and Shell's global expertise.
Shell LiveWIRE Scotland
A trailblazer since 1982, Shell LiveWIRE Scotland is a growth impact programme for business owners and entrepreneurs ready to take their company to the next level.
Shell LiveWIRE is Shell’s global enterprise development programme, supporting entrepreneurs with the skills, networks and confidence to start and grow businesses.
In the UK, Shell UK has worked with delivery partner Elevator UK to support small and medium sized businesses with growth potential, focusing on coaching, innovation and access to finance. In recent years, this has supported four cohorts of businesses and contributed to the creation of over 100 jobs.
Participants continue to benefit from access to the global Shell LiveWIRE alumni network, including mentoring, supply chain opportunities and the annual Top Ten Innovators competition.
More in people and communities
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