When Imperial Valley College launched a program training students to become plant operators and technicians in the emerging lithium industry, Corban Dillon enrolled in the inaugural class, hoping for a career in a promising field.
But when he completed his certificate in spring 2024, lithium-related jobs weren’t available. He enrolled in two more similar programs, yet the anticipated jobs involving the extraction of lithium — a key mineral in batteries essential to power the nation’s clean energy transition — remain sparse.
“A lot of us already have jobs or have families and are trying to juggle all that and trying to get a certification,” said Dillon, 41. “And not having actual potential employment as of right now, it’s hard for one person to sit there and say, ‘You know what? Let’s continue with this.’”
The situation speaks to a conundrum faced by community colleges when a new industry promises to come to town: Local residents want the new jobs. Companies say they want to hire local residents, but they’d need additional skills and training.
Schools such as Imperial Valley College are often left to figure out the best time to launch a program that will prepare students for the anticipated new jobs — before they’re filled by skilled out-of-towners.
Imperial Valley College, which says it is temporarily scaling back its lithium programs because of job market uncertainty, offers a case study in the pitfalls of trying to prepare students for emerging fields.
It’s an “incredibly common” challenge, said Betony Jones, a senior researcher in the UC Berkeley Labor Center’s green economy program and a former Biden administration official. Other fields that have faced similar uncertainty because of political and economic factors include solar and advanced manufacturing, which generally require postsecondary credentials.
“There’s this fine calibration required where employers need the workers for the projects, they can’t start training the workers when they need them,” Jones said. “But workers can’t train and then wait around.”
In Imperial County, an agricultural area that has among the highest poverty and unemployment rates in the state, the stakes are particularly high. In March, its unemployment rate was 16.9%, more than triple that of neighboring counties.
“The mentality that we see today here is: If we want a future, we need to leave the valley. If we want a good job, we need to leave the valley,” said Priscilla Lopez, the county’s director of workforce and economic development. “But wouldn’t it be great to have these opportunities so that your kids can see the opportunities here?”
When three companies began seriously eyeing the region for its lithium reserves around a decade ago, attention quickly turned to jobs. The region touted itself as “Lithium Valley,” and Berkshire Hathaway Energy Renewables announced it could launch commercial extraction operations by 2026.
The reality has been different. BHE Renewables only just completed construction on its demonstration plant, Christina Fleming, senior vice president of mineral development, wrote in an email.
Controlled Thermal Resources, another company active in the region, is in the “money-raising” stage, according to Jim Turner, the company’s president. Lithium extraction jobs are at least about two years away, he said.
Lithium batteries are the most common way to store wind and solar energy and power electric vehicles. An estimated 18 million metric tons of lithium carbonate is embedded in the hot brine deep beneath the Salton Sea, enough to power 375 million electric car batteries.
Calls for more education opportunities in Imperial Valley intensified as news of a potential lithium boom spread. The area’s two main higher education institutions — Imperial Valley College and a San Diego State satellite campus — acted fast.
San Diego State used $80 million in state funding to build a new STEM campus prioritizing science, technology, engineering and math.
New undergraduate degree programs in electrical engineering and chemistry will open to students to support local industry needs in the geothermal and lithium sectors, said John McMillan, the university’s assistant vice president of economic development.
Imperial Valley College received funding from the U.S. Department of Energy for its Lithium Industry Force Training program. The program’s three certificates — plant operator, chemical lab technician and instrumentation technician — can each be completed in two semesters, and courses include chemistry, math, hazmat training, water treatment plant operation and plant operation.
The community college has touted the certificate programs as a fast track into the lithium industry. “Are you ready to launch your career in the booming lithium industry? Imperial Valley College’s new chemical lab technician certificate program is your ticket in,” states a voice-over in a 2024 promotional video for one of the certificate programs.
And Imperial Valley residents, hungry for stable jobs close to home, have responded.
For George Prieto, the plant operator certificate is his first foray into higher education. Before a recent class, he showed off his newly issued badge for an internship at the local water and power utility. Prieto, 48, previously worked in retail merchandising and deejays on the weekends.
“Usually, when they have these jobs, people from all over the world come; this gives us a chance with this being our backyard,” Prieto said. “We don’t have to go and sacrifice and go somewhere else” for a job.
Industry representatives and the county blame the delayed timelines on a 2024 lawsuit by environmental groups. Changing politics and market forces are also at play. The lawsuit alleges Imperial County officials underestimated future environmental impacts — such as potential water pollution and health effects — of a project proposed by Controlled Thermal Resources.
The court rejected the legal challenge last year, and the environmental justice groups have appealed. The Trump administration also eliminated electric vehicle incentives last year, and both industry and the federal government have turned more attention to lithium projects in other states, including Arkansas and Nevada.
Near the Salton Sea, one of the three main companies working on lithium recently shifted some of its attention to data centers.
In late 2024, a member of the California Energy Commission warned Imperial County residents that “the Lithium Valley is not a sure thing,” citing the trend of federal funding from the Department of Energy going toward other states.
In August last year, San Diego State President Adela de la Torre was more blunt, writing in a commentary piece that “unless progress in Lithium Valley accelerates rapidly, these students will graduate into an empty local job market.”
“The timing thing has been something that’s out of our control,” San Diego State’s McMillan said in an interview. But the university can guarantee, he said, that students “will have a quality engineering and chemistry education that can make them effective in many of the industries out here.”
Imperial Valley College will soon graduate its third year of industry-trained students.
“The original plan was to time all of these programs sequential to once the industry comes up to speed,” said Lennor Johnson, who leads the Imperial Community College District. By now, he said, “we thought we would be 100% in full operation with Lithium Valley.”
A total of 173 students have enrolled in certification programs since fall 2023; 42 have completed their certificates and 57 are currently enrolled. As of fall 2025, a total of 16 students had found jobs directly related to their certificates, Johnson said.
Imperial Valley College has reduced the number of students in each cohort and will not offer two of the certificates next year. The plan is to bring those programs back in the 2027-28 academic year, if that timing lines up with the industry’s projections on jobs.
Prieto is hopeful that his certificate will be transferable to other industries, while Dillon believes the huge amount of lithium under Imperial County means the industry will come to full fruition eventually. In April, he started a full-time job with a mining company, with good pay, benefits, room and board while on-site, and a company car.
There’s just one catch: The job isn’t in Imperial County.
Rode writes for the Hechinger Report, which produced this article and is a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education.
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