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Jobs in energy project development: what the public data says about pay, growth, and hiring

29 sourced entries · Checked October 17, 2026

No opinion survey, no "best employer" list. This page lines up what the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Department of Energy's workforce report, and the solar jobs census publish about the roles a project actually runs on: development and project management, interconnection and electrical engineering, permitting, finance, construction management, and the trades. Wages are medians unless an entry says otherwise; growth figures are projections and say so.

Jump to: Pay and openings by role · Texas and the utility-scale construction industry · Growth, headcount and hiring difficulty · Why the demand exists

How to read it. BLS does not have an occupation called "solar developer" or "interconnection engineer"; the nearest published categories are named in each entry (project management specialists, electrical engineers, "engineers, all other", construction managers). They are proxies chosen by this site, not BLS mappings; most interconnection engineers are probably coded as electrical engineers, and utility-scale EPC work is split between the power-line construction industry (NAICS 237130) and electrical contractors (238210). Wage tables marked May 2023 are the last OEWS release loaded; BLS has since published May 2025.

Pay and openings by role

National medians and projected annual openings for the occupations closest to development, engineering, finance, permitting, construction management and the trades.

Our reading, not a sourced statement. The best-paid categories on this list are the ones a project cannot start without: the engineer who can run the interconnection model, the manager who can hold an EPC schedule, and the analyst who can price basis risk. The fastest-growing ones are field roles.

Texas and the utility-scale construction industry

State-level employment and wages, and the industry profile for the power-line and related-structures construction sector, which is where most utility-scale EPC work is coded.

Growth, headcount and hiring difficulty

Sector headcount, which sub-sectors employers expect to grow, and what employers say they cannot hire.

  • The U.S. energy sector employed 8.5 million workers in 2024, 5.4% of all U.S. jobs (measured). (U.S. DOE, 2025 U.S. Energy & Employment Report (USEER), national report, Aug. 2025)
  • Solar electric power generation employed 370,600 workers in 2024 (39.7% of EPG employment); employers anticipated 9.8% growth in solar EPG through 2025, the highest of any EPG subsector (employment measured; growth is employer-projected). (U.S. DOE, 2025 USEER national report, Aug. 2025)
  • Electric power generation workers had a median salary of $65,430, 32.2% above the U.S. median of $49,500; energy-sector median $58,810 (measured, 2024). (U.S. DOE, 2025 USEER national report, Aug. 2025)
  • USEER 2025: management positions were the hardest-to-fill category for electric power generation employers in utilities, construction, wholesale trade, professional/business services and other services; engineers/scientists hardest for manufacturing; top reason in EPG construction was lack of experience/training/technical skills (47%) (measured survey). (U.S. DOE, 2025 USEER national report PDF, Aug. 28, 2025)
  • USEER 2025 draws on a survey of more than 42,000 energy businesses alongside federal labor market data; employers cited persistent hiring challenges, particularly in technical and skilled trades roles (survey). (BW Research (USEER contractor), Sept. 1, 2025)
  • IREC's 2024 National Solar Jobs Census counted 280,119 solar jobs; utility-scale solar was an estimated 58,351 jobs (33%); installation and project development held 178,713 jobs; a large majority of firms still report difficulty finding qualified workers (measured). (IREC, National Solar Jobs Census 2024 (trends page), 2025)
  • Solar jobs were roughly flat in 2024 (+672 jobs nationally); after California, the next-largest solar employers were Florida, Texas, New York and Massachusetts, with Texas growing ~3% in 2024 (measured). (IREC, Solar Jobs Census program page, 2025)
Our reading, not a sourced statement. Employers report that management roles are the hardest to fill in generation construction, and that the gap is experience rather than headcount. That is the case for staying in a development or construction-management seat long enough to carry a project from request to energization.

Why the demand exists

The size of the interconnection queue and the cost position of solar, wind and storage, from the operator and the analysts that publish them.

  • ERCOT's generation interconnection queue held 1,949 active requests totaling 462,785 MW as of June 30, 2026: solar 162 GW (34.9%), battery 171 GW/410 GWh (36.9%), gas 78 GW, wind 48 GW; plus ~474 GW of large loads (~90% data centers) seeking interconnection (measured queue). (ERCOT, Texas Senate testimony slides, July 29, 2026)
  • Cost context: Lazard's 2025 LCOE+ finds utility-scale solar and onshore wind remain the most cost-effective new-build generation on an unsubsidized basis while new gas combined-cycle cost hit a 10-year high (analysis, June 2025). (Lazard press release, June 16, 2025)

How this page was made

Each entry is one statement tied to one public page; a second, independent pass loaded every cited page and kept only the statements that page supports. Secondary reports (trade press, law-firm alerts) are cited as what they are. Nothing here is advice, and this site does not rank, recommend or endorse any company; where a third party publishes a ranking, the entry says whose ranking it is. Found an error? Say so and it will be fixed.

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