On September 17^th, the Home Energy Efficiency Team (HEET), in collaboration with the International Ground Source Heat Pump Association (IGSHPA) and Geothermal Drillers Association (GDA), graduated the first class of seven new-to-the-ground-source geothermal industry professionals. Before the first day of class, these students had no prior knowledge or experience of the ground-source geothermal industry. These students graduated with an 80-hour certificate in “Geothermal Drilling Tutorial.”  The primary question running through your mind now must be, “Why was the class capped at just seven students?” Ironically, the same question could be challenged to the ground source geothermal industry: “Where is the widescale adoption and acceptance for ground source heat pumps?” The quote that perfectly sums up the industry's collective thoughts came from Twenty-Two-year-old Gerald Sylvain, “This class should have been bigger.”  He was one of the seven pilot class graduates and is now working for a drilling company in New England.

 
The Construction Workforce in 2024

Today's new hires have endless employment opportunities; 94% of all US jobs are outside the construction trades. The US construction workforce is 8.25 million Americans versus an overall US workforce of over 161 million Americans. Recruitment into the construction trades has been a persistent challenge since the early 2000s.

Starting with the tragic events of 9/11, the construction industry witnessed two strong decades of military recruitment to fight the “War on Terror.” These great individuals would have seamlessly found themselves empowered to work in the drilling industry, HVAC, and other building trades. A majority of the construction industry's recruitment pool was diverted to the Middle East, and over 50% of them returned with disabilities, preventing a fast transition back into the trades. Next, the 2008 economic downturn and housing market crash forced construction trade companies to evaluate staff size, lay off workers, and halt recruitment efforts. The young individuals the construction industry recruits today likely had family members who were impacted by losing their jobs and ultimately losing their homes.

Young people did not stop wanting to work in construction; they moved on to a higher civic duty or moved away from construction due to the impacts of job loss they experienced with their families. It is now the job of the ground source geothermal industry to recruit them back. The good news is that since June 2024, the construction industry has hired 35,000 new workers monthly. The unwelcome news is that new hires have multiple options for construction employment, with many roles offering competitive wages and benefits.

Recruiting the Ideal Individuals for Geothermal 

On September 4^th, the Bureau of Labor of Statistics released the current job report stating that there were 7.7 million open jobs in the United States. September 4th was also the first day of the Pilot Geothermal Drilling Tutorial. Individuals working in the geothermal heating and cooling industry can easily understand and see the exponential growth trajectory happening at this moment. However, the sector has poorly articulated the massive opportunity for new career-seeking individuals. Compounding the industry's lousy elevator pitch with nearly eight million open jobs and asking a recruit to invest ten days or 80 hours into a first-of-its-kind geothermal drilling tutorial program was a challenging sale.  However, the team involved with the pilot program tore down all the traditional ways of recruitment by seeking out industry collaboration through surveys, feedback, challenging discussions, and empowering nontraditional new hires to see the opportunities that Ground Source Geothermal had to offer.

Photo: Brock Yordy

The Pilot Geothermal Drilling Tutorials approach to recruitment was driven by HEET's passion for inspiring and empowering all individuals to join the ground-source geothermal workforce. HEET started by hosting workforce discussions with multiple stakeholders from the geothermal industry. Next, HEET surveyed licensed drilling companies in New England to better understand the placement and employment opportunities. HEET then contacted over twenty organizations, with multiple serving Justice 40 communities, to recruit candidates.   After dozens of submissions, HEET invited potential students to a site tour of the Framingham Network Geothermal site. The last step of the recruitment process included interviewing the candidate to understand their future goals and outlining expectations for the 80-hour course. HEET’s elegant process, through collaboration with the industry and candidate selection, resulted in ten students being invited to be part of the first pilot class.

Developing a Geothermal Drilling Tutorial

Initially, the eighty-hour course was developed to be a 50/50 blend of four hours of classroom and four hours of field time each day. The goal was to build a foundation that took classroom lessons and applied that knowledge to hands-on practical field applications.  The traditional learning process for new hires in the drilling industry is to learn through firsthand repetition in the field to develop new drillers over three to five years. However, we are running out of time to hit our 2030 net-zero goals, and we do not have three to five years to develop new drillers. Research done by the GDA revealed a common question amongst drilling companies: “How do you expect to develop competent drillers in just an 80-hour class?”    That question led the pilot training team to develop a practical approach to creating entry-level new hires capable of performing tasks safely and efficiently on a geothermal drilling site.

The pilot designed an 80-hour course around the role of “Field Technician.”  The tutorial shifted the blended classroom and field lesson plan, which started with a 3.5-day classroom intensive course based on onboarding a new individual to understand all aspects of a project. The classroom intensive included OSHA 1926 safety applicable for geothermal projects, industry terminology, outlining roles of driller – assistant drillers – field technician, field technician responsibilities, geothermal standard operating procedures, task hazard analysis, and the lifecycle of a geothermal drilling project from start to finish. The intensive wrapped with David Bowers, Local 150, Geothermal Drilling Apprenticeship trainer, addressing the class about becoming a driller, a quick 15 minutes with Garrett Carrino with American Well and Pump instructing the students to know what you are drilling into, and an hour-long conversation with Robert Meyer, president of Thermex Geothermal, on “Working in the business or on the business.”

Photo: Brock Yordy

After 40 hours in the classroom, the lessons moved into the field to visit active geothermal drilling projects. Skillings and Sons LLC of Amherst, New Hampshire, welcomed the geothermal drilling tutorial class to multiple sites. Jared Mullen and Chris Eaton, senior management of Skillings and Sons LLC, walked students through the drilling, loop installation, and grouting process of an elementary school and private college in western Massachusetts. The field lessons yielded six site visits with over 30 hours of site work, culminating in a full site tour of Boston University where 1500 ft boreholes were drilled, and RYGAN pipe was installed. The remaining class time was a blend of guest speakers discussing job opportunities, class projects, and a final test. Guest speakers included Tony and Kortney at Midwest Geothermal, Kim with Rototech, and Katie from Brightcore's recruitment team. Jeff Hammond, executive director of IGSHPA, also made an appearance to discuss the future of geothermal and thermal networks.

Developing Students of Geothermal Drilling 

The pilot tutorial curriculum empowered and created new hires, “Field Technicians,” who understood their role in completing daily tasks, meeting weekly goals, and how their participation impacted project completion, all while operating safely and efficiently. The program developed Field Technicians with the purpose of mastering their project responsibilities to propel them into future roles as an assistant driller and ultimately a leader on site.  Once a new hire develops the mindset of “Student of Geothermal Drilling,” their opportunity to perform and grow beyond entry level is not limited to years of specific experience in a role, but the amount of proper expertise required to master that role.

Empowering and developing a new generation of geothermal drilling professionals takes the whole “Village”—the Geothermal Industry. The HEET team, led by Executive Director Zeyneb Magavi, started with the vision that “we need nontraditional drillers to hit our 2030 net-zero goals.”  HEET then recruited the industry to compile what was required to kick off the Pilot Geothermal Drilling Tutorial. The HEET team and professionals at IGSHPA, Geothermal Market Capacity Coalition, and the drilling industry collaborated to create and support the pilot's vision.  The four individuals who championed coordination, recruitment, and everything between the start and graduation of the class were HEET Team Members Angie Alberto Escobar, Andrew Iliff, Rachel DeFronzo Wheeler, and Stacy Kinnaly. The program would not have happened without these four champions collaborating with all the fantastic industry professionals who contributed to the Geothermal Pilot Tutorial Success.