If Solar San Antonio's experience is any indicator, the transition to a green economy is going to be a bumpy ride.

Last year, the nonprofit organization sponsored a short training course in solar panel installation, and executive director Lanny Sinkin was confident there would be jobs waiting for nine trainees. News releases went out, hoopla was made. Then ... nothing.

“We couldn't find them jobs. It was a very painful experience,” Sinkin said.

Sinkin decided the organization should focus on creating so-called “green jobs,” leaving the training and education to community colleges and universities. The Alamo Colleges, the University of Texas at San Antonio and other local institutions have stepped up to the plate, creating new programs in alternative energy, beefing up research and weaving sustainability into core curriculum.

But colleges face the same riddles confounding city leaders in their quest to be on the leading edge of the green economy. What exactly is a green job, and how do you gauge demand in the marketplace? Does a green job require a degree or special certification?

“I really don't know what a green job is,” said Mac Rattan, owner of M&M Weatherization. “I have been doing weatherization for 15 years, so I guess we were green before green became cool.”

According to a city report, the San Antonio area has anywhere from 2,200 to 60,750 green jobs, depending on the source. Some count workers in traditional fields who contribute to green practices, such as an electrician who installs more efficient wiring, while others hew to a more pure definition, such as solar panel installers and wind turbine technicians.

“It is very hard to determine. There are shades of green,” said Larry Zinn, chairman of Mayor Julián Castro's Green Jobs Leadership Council.

According to the U.S. Commerce Department, in 2010 the San Antonio area had about 10,000 to 13,000 green jobs, running the gamut from low-wage laborer to Ph.D. scientist.

“The way I look at the whole notion of green jobs is that it represents a continuum from vocational and on-the-job training to jobs created through research and innovation,” said Les Shephard, director of the Texas Sustainable Energy Research Institute at UTSA.

For instance, weatherization is considered a green job because it improves a home's energy efficiency, but the $9- to $10-an-hour position does not require schooling. A solar panel installer, on the other hand, must pass a national certification test to hook solar cells into the main power grid, a steep hurdle for someone with no formal training.

St. Philip's College — one of the five Alamo Colleges — recently launched a two-year associate's degree program in alternative energy, as well as a short-term certificate course for working electricians and a one-year certificate for students with no electrical experience.

Other programs include an associate's degree in advanced water treatment at Northwest Vista College and short-term courses in green construction, energy auditing, weatherization, green house cleaning and landscaping, and electric car conversion.

The programs are a critical piece of Mission Verde, the city's strategic plan to bring green jobs to San Antonio and cultivate a work force for the growing market.

But gauging demand has proven a tough task as the market yo-yos with the economy, the cost of energy, policy decisions by governments and utilities, and consumer incentives such as rebates and federal income tax credits.

“It's a murky crystal ball,” said Dennis McDonaugh, chairman of the electronics and information technology department at St. Philip's.

Rodolfo Lozano, a Navy veteran and former oil field worker, learned that the hard way after taking Solar San Antonio's installation class last year. Lozano passed the national certification test and formed his own company, EcoTech Energies, but business has been slow.

“It's just really, really fidgety,” Lozano said of the market. “It will take off, it is just not happening now.”

Soon after Lozano finished the installation class, Austin's solar rebate program ran out of money, capsizing the market there and sending installation companies to San Antonio sniffing for work. Those more-experienced companies are winning the larger bids, making it tough for the little guys, Lozano said.

CPS Energy also cut off its solar rebate in 2009 because of a shortage of money, crashing projects and driving upstarts out of business.

“That was a total disaster,” Sinkin said.

Today, CPS' solar rebate program is fully funded and is expected to continue. Solar San Antonio has launched a campaign called Bring Solar Home that offers financing for residential customers. Combined with the rebate and an income tax credit, solar is becoming a doable investment for many families, and the market is picking up, Sinkin said.

But even if the rebate is locked in, green advocates are concerned about the drying up of federal stimulus funds, which are driving a good bit of the green activity and masking painful budget deficits at the state and local level.

M&M Weatherization, for instance, has increased its work force fivefold to 100 people because of an enormous infusion of money into the federal government's weatherization program.

“There are infrastructure dollars involved in buying vehicles and installation machines, there is definitely a sunset date on this (money),” Rattan said. “We are concerned.”

The Alamo Colleges has also made significant infrastructure investments, teaming up with four other community and technical colleges along the Interstate 35 corridor to attract as much grant and stimulus money as possible.

So far, the Alamo Colleges has netted $4.3 million, more than half from federal stimulus funds. Some of the money went to install a solar cell demonstration panel at St. Philip's Southwest Campus and to buy gleaming new training modules for the alternative energy programs.

St. Philip's McDonaugh believes that the first batch of 10 to 12 graduates will have no trouble finding work, but it is not clear what the future holds.

“If we turn out people who can't get hired, we are just shooting ourselves in the foot,” he said.

Sticking together is the key to making it work in the long run, said Shephard of the Texas Sustainable Energy Research Institute. He has reached out to city, industry, and university and community college partners, and he is planning a joint project that would bring St. Philip's students to UTSA to do research.

As far as UTSA is concerned, Shephard sees the university's role as doing research, turning discoveries into marketable solutions and graduating students who are “sustainability literate.”

Graduates will go on to teach children, lobby for public policy changes, start businesses, and design and engineer renewable energy technology, Shephard said. Some will start by working under Ph.D. scientists in labs at UTSA, which has a $50 million deal to conduct research on alternative energy for CPS.

“The role that universities play is to be the creators of knowledge,” Shephard said.