Overlooking the shoreline of Lake Michigan and an aging coal plant, a packed conference room was filled with families, advocates and Illinois legislators celebrating the graduation of two dozen newly trained clean energy workers.
“It’s not lost to me today that we’re sitting on the fifth floor of the College of Lake County in the shadow of fossil fuel energy, talking about clean energy,” said Richard Ammon, the college’s executive director of workforce initiatives. “There’s a reason we’re here, and that’s because the state of Illinois is doing some great things to ensure that we have a clean future, and this program is part of that future.”
With tears in his eyes, Alan Corea, a graduate of the latest cohort, spoke to the crowd last week, reflecting on what this achievement means to him.
“Through this journey, something changed for me,” he said. “I didn’t just gain knowledge about clean energy, equity and justice. I gained confidence, I gained discipline, I gained a vision.”
A Waukegan resident, Corea, 28, plans to enroll in the college’s electric vehicle program with hopes of becoming an EV technician.
“I started to understand that this work is bigger than the career,” Corea added. “This is about serving our communities. This is about making sure that the next generation doesn’t have to struggle the way many of us did, and find a door that will open.”
Graduate Alan Corea, center in hat, listens to speakers during the Climate and Equitable Jobs Act graduation ceremony at College of Lake County in Waukegan on Feb. 27, 2026. Corea spoke to the crowd, saying, “This work is bigger than the career.” (Talia Sprague/for the Chicago Tribune)
Corea is one of 146 graduates of Waukegan’s monthlong Bridge program under the Illinois Clean and Equitable Jobs Act, known as CEJA, passed in 2021. Illinois’ ambitious climate law aims to transition the state to 100% renewable, carbon-free energy, as well as electrify the state’s transportation sector, by 2050.
Core to the landmark climate law is creating “a just transition,” said Francisco Lopez Zavala, the Illinois Environmental Council’s policy program associate. For lawmakers, this means building a clean energy workforce in Illinois’ most environmentally burdened communities.
Over 700 Illinoisans have graduated from CEJA workforce training hubs across the state, said the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Development, which oversees the program in partnership with local nonprofits and community colleges. That number continues to grow as CEJA hubs prepare for new cohorts every month.
These hubs have been launched in 14 disadvantaged and historically disinvested communities across the state, from Chicago’s South and West sides to cities like Rockford, Joliet and Aurora.
Waukegan was a natural fit as a hub.
With five Superfund sites, groundwater pollution and toxic coal ash from the nearby Waukegan Generating Station, the Lake County city has long grappled with environmental harms, said Mayra Mendez, executive director of Clean Power Lake County, an environmental advocacy group in Waukegan and member of Illinois’ Clean Jobs Coalition that helped craft CEJA’s bill language.
Lake County residents experience a reduced life expectancy linked to poor air quality, Mendez said, much of it tied to the former coal plant along the lakefront. Although CEJA accelerated the plant’s closure in 2022, coal ash continues to leach into groundwater near Lake Michigan.
Recent federal delays to close ash impoundments by the Trump administration’s Environmental Protection Agency will allow Waukegan’s coal ash to remain unaddressed until 2032, raising concerns for Illinois legislators like state Sen. Adriane Johnson, a Buffalo Grove Democrat.
“Massive flooding, which is soon to come on these shoreline cities like Waukegan, could disturb the coal ash, and it could contaminate our source of drinking water,” Johnson said.
The Waukegan Generating Station with coal ash ponds, far left, on Feb. 27, 2026, in Waukegan. The facility closed in June 2022 after operating for nearly 100 years. (Talia Sprague/for the Chicago Tribune)
She said the clean energy workforce movement is important for Waukegan, a community that “has experienced historic disinvestment” and “been dumped on with all of the brownfields.”
The Waukegan hub, located at the college’s Lakeshore campus, has successfully graduated 14 cohorts in its first year, training students in heating, ventilation, air conditioning, weatherization, solar construction and electric vehicles.
CEJA students arrive with significant financial struggles, Ammon said. Some have been unhoused, and others were formerly incarcerated.
“We got enough support from the state of Illinois to be able to change lives,” he said.
The 120-hour program provides green energy certifications, workplace safety training and college credit. CEJA also offers “barrier reduction services” — paying for gas, renewing driver’s licenses, helping to expunge conviction records, even securing temporary housing — to ensure students can complete the course, said Larry Dawson, CEJA’s northern regional administrator at the state commerce department.
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Support continues for up to a year after graduation, including help with child care and counseling.
“You want to try to make sure people can get rooted before we have the birdie fly out,” Dawson said.
Still, challenges remain. While Illinois’ clean energy sector is poised for growth, and state legislators feel CEJA is on track for 2050 goals, administrators say some employers remain hesitant to hire workers from disadvantaged backgrounds.
“There are some of the participants who are justice impacted, and they’re some cases rightfully so, of some employers having some reluctance (to hire),” Dawson said.
Getting more employers in the room at these monthly graduation ceremonies is a priority for Dawson and Antonio Garcia, director of CEJA programs for Lake County Workforce Development.
“If someone says, ‘Oh, there’s no (clean energy) talent for hiring,’ tell them to come to Waukegan,” Garcia said. “We have plenty of folks ready to go.”
Antonio Garcia, Climate & Equitable Jobs Act program administrator at Lake Country Workforce Development, speaks during at the graduation ceremony at College of Lake County in Waukegan on Feb. 27, 2026. (Talia Sprague/for the Chicago Tribune)
While the state works toward its sweeping clean energy goals, Garcia said this CEJA program prepares communities like Waukegan to meet the renewable moment when it comes.
“From the governor’s vision of 2050 being all electrical, that’s going to create jobs,” he said. “So we have to prepare our community to be ready for those jobs.”
For graduates like Zion resident Gregory Smith, 55, the opportunity feels long overdue.
“I wish this could have come sooner, a lot faster, because this is where the future is going,” said Smith during his graduation speech. “Energy products, clean air, not burning coal no more, saving the economy, house owners, and communities being able to breathe better.”
He plans to enroll in the college’s home inspection program after graduation.
As applause echoed through the conference room, optimism was palpable about a new workforce taking shape — one trained not to extract or burn but to build and restore.
“Look at us,” Smith told the crowd. “We’re making history right now, whether you know it or not.”
