Aberdeen’s skills acceleration group, X-Academy has been forced to shut down due to a lack of funding.
The organisation, backed by energy consultancy group Xodus, made the “extremely tough decision” to shut down following a lack of public and private sector funding.
It is understood that due to its ties to a private company, the skills accelerator was cut off from the majority of public funds available.
X-Academy was launched with funding from ETZ Ltd and ScotWind consortium partners, BP and EnBW in November 2021.
BP and EnBW made annual contributions to X-Academy and was aiming to continue to do so, Energy Voice understands.
ETZ Ltd provided funds on behalf of the Scottish government as it is a delivery partner for the North East Economic Recovery and Skills Fund.
It is understood that this was one-time payment and ETZ Ltd never expected to make repeat funding contributions to X-Academy.
Stephen Swindell, chief executive of Xodus said: “We have taken the extremely tough decision to wind down X-Academy after significant efforts to secure public and private sector funding needed at this critical time have not been successful.
“This is not a decision that has been taken lightly given the important achievements and progress X-Academy has made as a non-profit making energy jobs accelerator, however, we are not in a position to continue funding X-Academy indefinitely without additional industry or government support.”
A former X-Academy boss still sees value in having a north-east Scotland-based renewable energies skills accelerator.
Peter Tipler, former Managing Director of X-Academy has since launched a new not-for-profit that looks to pick up where Xodus’ project left off, Energy Jobs Accelerator.
He is now looking for work following the skills accelerator folding.
Mr Tipler said: “The feedback we got from industry was absolutely fantastic, so it’s really clear that the mission was there and we had so much private sector support.”
He explained that there are “a couple of idiosyncrasies of how public sector funding works” that limited the venture.
Mr Tipler continued: “There’s a lot of funding out there for the mission X-Academy had which can only go to independent not for profits.”
He later added: “That meant we were automatically ineligible for something like 70 to 80% of the funding that was out there.”
The Scottish Government said it was “extremely disappointed” to hear that X-Academy was forced to shut.
A spokesperson for the Scottish Government said: “This is a privately funded initiative but Ministers stand ready to explore whether, even at this late stage, it is possible to ensure this this excellent project has a future.”
X-Academy’s work
Late last year X-Academy published its “Seize the Opportunity” report which forecast a 73,000 growth in energy jobs by 2030, if government and industry collaborate in accelerating the transition to renewables.
The group said at the time that the growth of the renewables job market now will be the determining factor in deciding if the higher end of the job prediction will be met.
Mr Swindell added: “Two years ago, we took the step to think differently about what the sector requires to build out the people capacity needed to deliver the energy transition.
“It was developed by industry, for industry and we are proud that we have created opportunities for people from different skills backgrounds to work across diverse energy projects and supported the Scottish economy.
“I would like to sincerely thank the X-Academy team for their passion and outstanding commitment and our funding partners along with the many stakeholders who supported us along the way.”
Late last year, former North Sea Transition Authority chief executive, Andy Samuel joined the X-Academy as a strategic advisor.
Mr Samuel came into support the senior leadership team in its aim to accelerate clean jobs by preparing the workforce for employment in green fields.
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