Training Energy Data Scientists : Universities and Industry Need to Work Together to Bridge the Talent Gap

The workforce crisis is nothing new to the U.S. power industry. It has been a growing concern of both governments and industry organizations since the early 2000s. Meanwhile, the growth of data during the past decade has led to a demand surge for data analytics across all business sectors. The shortage of an electricity workforce and the increasing demand for data analytics present an emerging challenge as well as opportunity for university power engineering programs to bridge the data analytics talent gap. After gathering various perspectives from members of academia, industry, and government, we propose an interdisciplinary and entrepreneurial approach to revising the traditional power engineering curriculum for training the next generation of energy data scientists.