IndustriAll Europe warmly welcomes the outcomes of the North Sea Summit in Hamburg on 26 January, where leaders from nine North Sea countries signed the Hamburg Declaration, reaffirming their ambition to build the North Seas into the world’s largest clean energy hub. The declaration represents a renewed commitment to large scale offshore wind development, greater regional cooperation, and strengthened energy security for Europe. 

The Hamburg Declaration sets out a comprehensive agenda to accelerate the North Sea's transformation into a resilient, interconnected, and competitive clean energy powerhouse. Key elements include:

• Enhanced regional cooperation through the North Seas Energy Cooperation (NSEC) and Greater North Sea Basin Initiative (GNSBI) to align planning, grid development and project pipelines.
• Concrete measures to “get offshore wind back on track,” including stable tender pipelines, simplified permitting, de risked investments, and support for European manufacturing and port infrastructure.
• A shared commitment to deliver part of the North Sea’s 300 GW offshore ambition by 2050 through cross border projects, backed by a forthcoming Offshore Financing Framework (OFF).
• Investment in skills, training and workforce development to ensure that labour needs can be met across the region’s growing offshore energy sectors.

IndustriAll Europe welcomes these commitments. However, to deliver them sustainably and at the required scale, workers and their unions must be actively involved in shaping Europe’s offshore wind future.

Offshore wind is critical — worker involvement is essential to achieve aims

IndustriAll Europe has repeatedly underlined that Europe cannot meet its renewable energy targets — including the commitment to reach 103 GW of offshore wind by 2030 — without a robust, well supported workforce across the entire wind supply chain.

According to our position paper 'Securing Europe’s Energy Transition through High Quality Jobs in the Offshore Wind Supply Chain', today’s wind sector already employs 77,000 offshore workers, and demand is set to surge dramatically. But high inflation, supply chain bottlenecks and declining investor confidence are putting pressure on the industry. Europe risks falling short of its ambitions unless it puts quality jobs, industrial strategy and skills at the centre of offshore expansion.

Our key demands include:

• Strong industrial policy tools that support European manufacturing and defend Europe’s position in the global wind sector.
• An energy regulatory framework that balances project profitability with stable, affordable energy prices — without undermining workers’ rights or working conditions.
• A long term approach to skills, training and retention to meet massive future labour needs.
• A regulatory framework that protects workers and ensures decent pay, safe working conditions and collective bargaining coverage throughout the value chain.
• Embedding quality jobs and social conditionality in all public support and procurement.

The Hamburg Declaration recognises the importance of skills and of strengthening the European supply chain — but this must be matched with concrete commitments to quality employment, social dialogue, and worker participation in planning and governance.

A Just Transition in the North Sea must be a social transition

For industriAll Europe, the North Sea Summit highlights both the scale of opportunity and the risks of continuing with a fragmented approach. Offshore wind can deliver tens of thousands of high quality industrial jobs across Europe — in manufacturing, installation, operations, maintenance and port infrastructure — but only if strong labour standards and robust investment frameworks are guaranteed.

Without this, Europe risks continued offshoring of manufacturing, skills shortages, and further erosion of working conditions in a strategic sector.

Judith Kirton-Darling, General Secretary of industriAll Europe:

“The Hamburg Declaration shows that governments recognise the urgency of accelerating offshore wind — but delivery will only succeed if workers and their unions are fully involved at every stage. We need major, long term investments in Europe’s industrial base, strong and resilient supply chains, and quality jobs that can attract and retain the skilled workforce this transition demands. A fair, worker centred approach is the only way to build a North Sea clean energy hub that delivers for people, industry and the planet.”

Policy Paper: Securing Europe’s Energy Transition through High-quality Jobs in the Offshore Wind Supply Chain DE EN FR