Michigan’s Climate Fellows: Sustaining Clean Energy Jobs Amid Scaling Challenges

Since its inception in March 2024, Michigan’s MI Healthy Climate Fellows has aggressively moved to build climate resilience and sustainability capacity at the community level. The program’s two cohorts have been delivered back-to-back: the first, in 2024, with 30 fellows over eight months; the second, beginning in December 2024, with 31 fellows serving 11 months. Now, under the current budget, cohort three (2026) will be the final round with 15 fellows from Jan 21 to Dec 18, 2026. This scaling down reflects possible funding limits or strategy shifts.

The program acts as both a skill development pipeline and a vehicle for advancing Michigan’s Healthy Climate Plan—whose goals include equitable, carbon-neutral economic transformation by 2050. Projects supported by fellows include data analysis for energy efficiency and water savings, workforce development research and youth STEAM outreach, climate action organizing, tribal support, and GHG benchmarking. These diverse efforts align with statewide priorities under the MI Healthy Climate Plan.

Michigan’s broader clean energy ecosystem is also demonstrating strong momentum. As of a 2024 report, the state has ~127,690 clean energy jobs—more than in 44 other states—with employment in this sector growing nearly twice as fast as the overall Michigan economy. The state leads the Midwest in clean energy workforce growth. Key sectors showing rapid growth include energy efficiency, clean transportation, and renewables.

Strategic implications: First, the MHC Fellows model provides a replicable template for workforce-growth programs aimed at climate goals, helping communities under-resourced in institutional capacity. Second, the linkage between state policy (like the MI Healthy Climate Plan) and federal funding (e.g., via AmeriCorps, Inflation Reduction Act) is leveraged to maximize impact. Third, with only three cohorts planned under current funding, questions arise about sustainability beyond 2026, institutional learning, and long-term measurement of outcomes. Fourth, monitoring whether the fellows get retained in climate careers—or merely transient placements—is essential to achieving lasting workforce change.

Open questions include: What metrics will EGLE and its partners use to assess the long-term impact of the fellows (e.g., jobs created, emissions reduced, host organizational capacity)? What plans exist for scaling – either expanding or sustaining – the program post-2026, especially since the third cohort is the final one under current budget? How are host organizations coping with absorbing fellows once the program ends—i.e., sustainability of added capacity? And how is quality and equity being ensured across widely varied project domains and locations?