A huge wave of redundancies is heading for the energy sector, as companies cut back on staffing levels in the face of low oil prices. BP is cutting 10,000 jobs or around 15% of its global workforce. Centrica is cutting 5,000 jobs, while OVO Energy announced 2,600 job cuts.

Rosa Stewart, a UK-based energy project finance lawyer, however, is hoping to turn the wave of redundancies into a wave of new clean energy startups through a not-for-profit initiative that would help job leavers become startup founders.

“All the energy companies are decarbonizing and have net-zero targets but no idea how to reach them. Now we have all these energy experts becoming available who could work on the problem,” she says. Stewart set up a project called Spinning Reserve (named after the energy industry term for the spare capacity that energy operators need to build into their systems), which aims to match energy sector experts either with existing clean energy startups or with potential co-founders interested in forming a new company together.

Source Credit: Sifted