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Previous work on the employment impacts of energy efficiency investment programmes in EU countries suggests that in the majority of cases, energy efficiency investment increased employment. Key findings of a comprehensive study by the Association for the Conservation of Energy were:

• Of 44 case studies carried out in 9 EU10 countries, 38 were found to have generated additional employment.
• Per million Euros (MEuro) of total expenditure (both government and private) energy efficiency programmes typically resulted in eight to 14 additional person-years of employment.
• In the residential sector, employment gains were typically higher than in other sectors, although the investments were less cost-effective in terms of energy savings than in other sectors.
• Many of the programmes identified a majority of new employment in manual occupations – this was especially true of the residential sector.
• The employment effect of energy efficiency programmes is almost always positive, and the jobs are often in sectors, locations and skill groups that are prioritised in employment policies. However, the number of jobs created is typically small compared to the size of the investments. Therefore creation of employment will be a desirable side effect of the programmes, but should not be the primary objective.

This picture is almost entirely positive, and it appears that public or private energy efficiency programmes both can stimulate beneficial local and national job creation. The fact that the majority of job creation in the residential sector was manual employment is also advantageous as this particular skills base is prevalent in CEE nations where, coincidentally, high-rise buildings much larger proportions of the housing stock than in most other European countries.

The study found three main components to the employment impact of energy efficiency investment programmes. First is the direct employment resulting from the manufacture, installation and operation of energy efficiency products and processes, as well as in the management of these activities. Second is the counterbalancing negative effect on employment in the energy supply industries resulting from concomitant reductions in energy demand . And third, there is secondary employment generation or loss. This results from increases or decreases in spending in sectors with different labour intensities. For example, energy consumers who experience energy bill reductions will have increased income available for other spending. Furthermore, government spending may be altered by the provision of grants or subsides, tax receipts on energy and altered unemployment benefit bills.
The investigation also found some evidence of a dichotomy between the effects of unilateral (national) and EU-wide investment in energy efficiency programmes on employment. Macro-economic modelling suggested that where countries initiate energy efficiency programmes there can be some job losses at the EU level in the short term. However at the national level negative outcomes are very rare in terms of employment, and in the longer term the outcome is always positive. This would suggest that coordination of energy efficiency implementation at the national level should be a priority, and the modelling suggested that EU-wide policy adoption produces greater gains in employment and larger reductions in energy consumption than in unilateral scenarios, and that these gains were also more persistent.