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This paper uses register data and open vacancy data to determine if green industries require different skills than other employers. This is done by focusing on how the entry of the battery producer Northvolt changed the labour demand when establishing in Skellefteå (Sweden). Using data on all vacancies in Sweden 2016–2023 we analyse the skill- and knowledge demand in Northvolt's job ads and compare that to the labour demand at the local, regional and national level. In terms of occupations, we find only minor tendencies towards a higher demand of higher-skilled jobs compared to incumbent local employers, but an increase of service work and a reinforcement of the local manual work specialization. Using language models, we combine the vacancies with a scheme of skills and knowledge from the ESCO-taxonomy. Interestingly, Northvolt deviates in both the skill- and knowledge requirements compared to similar jobs in the rest of the country. This especially concerns a greater emphasis on information, collaboration and communication skills in contrast to other employers who stress manufacturing experience. Despite these skill-specific differences, our experimental approach finds little evidence that the entry spurred a significant diversification and upgrading of the regional labour market.

This research note contains an update of the research program “A promised land? Drivers, challenges and opportunities related to the (green) industrialization of Northern Sweden,” (nr. M22-0029) awarded by the Swedish Riksbankens Jubileumsfond’s in 2022. The document summarizes work in progress and is updated annually in different versions according to the requirements of the program. 

This interdisciplinary program aims to understand the economic, social, and political challenges and opportunities of the ongoing industrial transformation in northern Sweden. A key element of the program is to identify drivers, obstacles, and preconditions in a historical, present, and forward-looking process-perspective. 

Northvolt är i kris och olyckskorparna flockas. Det säkra i sammanhanget är att inta en pessimistisk hållning. Men, om vi lyfter blicken ochser Northvolt som det företaget de facto är – en del i den europeiskabilindustrins omställning – finns det skäl att våga sig på en meroptimistisk hållning, skriver ekonomihistorikern Mattias Näsman

Recent large investments in northern Sweden connected to the green transition – primarily within mining and manufacturing (fossil-free steel, batteries) – have led to substantial increases in local demand for labour. In a territory with low unemployment and a decreasing labour supply due to ageing and a history of net outmigration, there is a substantial risk that this increased labour demand will, particularly in the short term, draw at least to some extent from the public sector.

Against this backdrop, the chapter examines the dynamic effects of employment expansion in the mining and manufacturing industries on public sector employment in northern Sweden during the period 1990–2019. It also analyses which factors affect the probability of a worker leaving the public sector for a job in manufacturing or mining.

Our results suggest that the expansion of manufacturing and, in particular, mining has a negative short-term effect on public sector employment. The largest effect is attributable to poaching from public administration, with education and health less affected. Assuming a linear trend based on previous labour market interdependencies, a three standard deviation increase in mining (about 2,700 new jobs) and manufacturing (about 10,800 new jobs) could potentially lead to 8% of the current public administration workforce being poached. The results also indicate that younger individuals, low- and high-income earners, and those highly educated in the social or technical sciences are the most likely to leave the public sector. In the longer perspective, these vacancies go on to be filled by skilled but inexperienced workers.

A number of policy implications arise from the above findings. First, given the regional dimension of job mobility, policy-makers should consider how large investments influence the other parts of a regional economy, rather than simply attending to the immediate demands of focal industries. Second, while the poaching of public sector employees will inevitably occur, the functioning of the public sector also hinges on the supply of workers entering the labour market. There is therefore a pressing need to bolster the status of key public sector jobs and improve working conditions, thereby ensuring they are regarded as viable career opportunities when mining and manufacturing expands. The public sector should also ensure that it is in a position to attract and retain workers crowded out of the mining and manufacturing in the event of future rationalisation. Third, general policy interventions may not serve local needs, especially the spatial mismatch of available jobs and supply of workers. Support for relocation tailored to local demands is therefore crucial.

This article utilizes news media representations to scrutinize the symbolic construction and legitimizing support for green megaprojects, with a particular focus on Northvolt’s battery factory in Skellefteå, Sweden. The study reveals that the media portrayed the project as crucial for local development, driven by Northvolt’s explicit competition, Sweden’s national ambition to lead in green technology, and a neoliberal agenda for regional economic growth. These narratives, deeply rooted in ideological fantasies about the implications of such a megaproject for a small, struggling community, effectively suppressed concerns about colonialism, environmental risks, and indigenous rights. The media’s emphasis on perceived benefits overshadowed potential risks, prompting questions about the long-term impact of such projects on local communities and the environment. The article argues that while these investments are framed as opportunities for progress, they may perpetuate historical patterns of exploitation and overlook critical socio-environmental issues.

This study uses reconstructions of historical Environmental Protection Expenditure Accounts (EPEA) in Sweden from 1970–2020 to present a time series approach that analyses the demand for environmental services. The paper’s aim is to analyse environmental adaptation as a historical, economic and environmental process and to explore structural shifts suggestive of an overall periodisation of environmental demand. The article contributes to a deeper understanding of demand-side factors in environmental adaptation as part of contemporary economic history. The investigation also provides evidence that the income elasticity of environmental demand was slightly higher than 1.0 and largely stable over time, and even though we were able to detect trend breaks, there is insufficient evidence for major structural breaks suggesting sharp shifts in societal environmental preferences. Policies requiring sharply rising environmental expenditures should consider this level of historical stability.

In recent years, Skellefteå has had significant population growth linked to the establishment of Northvolt. Between 2020 and 2023, the population growth in Skellefteå was 4.6 percent, which should be compared with an average population growth of 1.7 percent in Sweden. The main purpose of the report has been to describe how the labor market in Skellefteå has changed after 2017. 

The population growth can largely be explained by a sharp increase in immigration. For many years, the municipality has indeed had a positive net migration which, however, has not been able to compensate for the aging population. Therefore, the population has remained at stable levels until 2017. The strong immigration in recent years is mainly made up of men aged 25 to 64. In general, the proportion of men in the age range 15 to 64 is increasing, while the number of women aged 15 to 24 is decreasing, which may pose a future challenge connected to how to break the negative nativity trend. Even before 2017, Skellefteå had a high proportion of men, and the reduction in the number of women aged 15 to 24 may in the long run lead to a further distortion of the gender balance. A large part of the immigrants has for a long time consisted of people from the immediate area (mainly Umeå, but also smaller municipalities). This trend continues after 2017, when the number of migrants from Umeå increased even further. A significant part of the immigrants are also primarily men, but also women, from other countries. This too can pose a future challenge if they are not integrated into society.

Those who move to Skellefteå often get jobs that only require shorter training or introduction. This has increased since the establishment of Northvolt regardless of education level. At the same time, the degree of job changes is high among these immigrants, which indicates that these occupations are entry-level occupations. We also see that emigration has also increased in recent years, and this mainly concerns women aged 15–24. While immigrants mainly come from the surrounding municipalities, young Skellefteå residents move to university towns and the larger cities. In addition to the migration patterns, the commuting patterns have also changed somewhat over time. Commuters to Skellefteå mainly come from Umeå, and this has increased after 2017, followed by Stockholm (which, however, is less than half the number compared to those from Umeå) closely followed by Piteå, Luleå, Norsjö and Robertsfors. Apart from Umeå and to some extent Luleå, the number of individuals for all municipalities to commute from has decreased after 2017, while commuting from Skellefteå also has generally increased. Here too, Umeå is the most common place of work, followed by the neighboring municipalities.

The proportion of employees in professions that require a longer university or college education is increasing in Skellefteå, which in itself is a positive development as it generally reduces sensitivity to future structural changes. On the other hand, the percentage who get a job immediately after graduation is decreasing, even among those with a longer university or college education. This applies both to those already living in Skellefteå, but above all to immigrants who, to an increasingly lesser extent, start working in professions that require a university degree. This may be due to a matching problem between the applicants and the employers. But it may also be due to a change in search behavior among job seekers, where new graduates immediately after graduation first apply for a simpler profession and then for more qualified professions. It may also be due to higher requirements for work experience among employers. As the large majority of immigrants with university qualifications remain within this occupational group, it indicates a growing matching problem driven by over-education as the labour market segments experiencing employment growth do not require university education.

A high school diploma (gymnasium) is the most common highest level of education in Skellefteå. At the same time, the number of employees in professions that require a shorter education or introduction is decreasing. The fact that the number of people employed decreases in professions that require a shorter education or introduction need not be a negative thing given that it does not lead to increased unemployment. It can even be a positive development if it leads to more people being employed with more advanced tasks. On the other hand, it can lead to increased unemployment among individuals with a shorter education, a group that has more difficulty adapting to changed conditions on the labor market. Given such a development, it may become necessary to carry out continuing education efforts for that group. A certain increase in the workforce that has not completed upper secondary education can be seen in recent years and is also a trend that should be actively countered.

Incomes in Skellefteå have risen since 2017, especially men's incomes. Immigrants to Skellefteå generally have lower wages compared to the population as a whole. This is probably due to the fact that the immigrants work to a greater extent in occupations that require shorter training or introduction. The move-in together with generally higher wages and limited construction has had a positive effect on housing prices. Higher housing prices should lead to increased construction in the municipality, but this can be dampened by a higher cost situation (wages, building materials, interest, etc.) in the construction sector. Limited housing construction leads to a redistribution of income from wage earners to property owners. Those who move into Skellefteå live to a greater extent in tenements and condominiums compared to the average Skellefteå resident. Immigrants settle to a large extent in the central parts of Skellefteå. Again, this does not have to be negative as it often takes time for a new mover to get to know a new city and it can take time to find longer-term accommodation. Given that the moving surplus also consists of many young men, centrally located apartments are more suitable for this group compared to detached houses for families with children. The limited mobility on the housing market can be another reason why immigrants end up in certain areas and in certain types of housing to a large extent. It is possible to make some comparisons with the labor market, where a simpler job can be an entry-level job while you are looking for a longer-term job. 

In the second half of the twentieth century, the car industrybecame a lightning rod for debates about human contributions to climatechange. Widespread motorisation galvanised the green movements of the1960s and 1970s, regulators increasingly demanded the use of pollutionand climate mitigation technologies, and carmakers responded to thischanging consumer and regulatory environment by gradually observingstricter emissions standards and innovating away from combustible enginesat the turn of the millennium. This paper traces the arc of the relationshipbetween car manufacturing and climate change through a businesshistorical lens, from the development of internal combustion engines andtheir alternatives to the political economy of an energy transition and thedecision to prioritise electric vehicles. Our analysis aims to lay a foundationfor further research on industry and climate change.

Following substantial investments in battery production and fossil-free steel, a few select places in northern Sweden are currently undergoing rapid economic and cultural changes. The aim of this article is to explore the role language education plays for three different groups of (im)mobile subjects – refugees, labor migrants, and cosmopolitan elites – in the ongoing social transformations. By using the time-consuming and ideologically charged social practice of teaching and learning languages as a lens, it is argued that although framed as a sustainability project, the pace of the transformation is set by the accelerating logic of capitalism, posing a challenge to the democratic planning of inclusive local communities, as well as to societal subsystems characterized by much slower temporal regimes. Hence, although Sweden is committed to a “just transition” as part of the Paris Agreement, some are obviously benefiting much more than others from this transition. This paper further highlights the potentially high costs for the local communities that “win” the bids for the new green industries. Apart from considerable economic costs in the present, another result might also be increased social stratification and weakening social cohesion in the long term.

Ett fåtal utvalda plats i norra Sverige upplever nu hastiga ekonomiska och kulturella förändringar till följd av omfattande investeringar i batteriproduktion och fossilfritt stål. Syftet med den här artikeln är att utforska vilken roll språkundervisning spelar för tre olika grupper av (im)mobila subjekt – flyktingar, arbetsmigranter och kosmopolitiska eliter – i den pågående samhällsomvandlingen. Genom att utgå från de tidskrävande och ideologiskt laddade sociala praktikerna undervisning och lärande av språk visas här att även om samhällsomvandlingen ofta ramas in som ett hållbarhetsprojekt så bestäms hastigheten av kapitalismens accelererande logik, vilket innebär utmaningar för demokratiska planeringsprocesser, likväl som för samhälleliga delsystem som präglas av betydligt långsammare temporala regimer. Även om Sverige har förbundit sig att arbeta för en rättvis omställning som en del av Parisavtalet blir det därför tydligt att somliga tjänar betydligt mer än andra på den här omvandlingen. Artikeln belyser vidare de potentiellt höga kostnaderna för lokalsamhällen som ”vinner” tävlingen om de nya gröna industrierna. Förutom betydande ekonomiska kostnader i samtiden kan ett annat resultat bli ökad stratifiering och minskad social sammanhållning på lång sikt.