Japan Hopes 30,000 Teenagers Want to Learn to Make Electric Batteries

In response to growing demand for electric battery production, Japan is attempting to train tens of thousands of teenagers to design and engineer them.

As Nikkei Asia reports(Opens in a new window), the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry believes the country requires 30,000 newly-trained people to work in electric battery production by 2030. Currently around 10,000 people work in the battery production sector in Japan.

According to Mitsutaka Fujita, a researcher at Tokyo-based Techno Systems Research, “Good battery engineers are lacking worldwide … You need to train engineers and designers before they become good, but currently they’re lacking everywhere.”

In order to expand the workforce over the next seven years to meet that demand, the Japanese government is launching a national effort to teach teenagers how to make batteries. It begins in December, with an experimental class for 40 students focused on battery technology at the Osaka Prefecture University College of Technology.

The class will be taught by retired engineers from companies already producing batteries, includes virtual tours of EV battery-making facilities, and students will get to use battery-making equipment supplied by Japan’s National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology.

If the experimental class is successful, the plan is to then offer similar courses at high schools, colleges, and universities next year across Japan.

The newly-trained young workforce this initiative creates won’t have any trouble finding employment, which is likely to be a big draw for any teenagers offered the training. Japan is home to some of the biggest vehicle manufacturers in the world (e.g. Honda, Toyota, Nissan), all of whom need EV batteries and fresh talent to help advance the technology. There is also Panasonic, which currently acts as the main supplier of electric batteries for Tesla.