UK AI Exposure · Skilled trades occupations
Electrical and electronic trades n.e.c.
Job holders in this group perform a variety of electrical and electronic occupations not elsewhere classified in minor group 524: Electrical and electronic trades.
- Employees (UK)
- 20k
- Median annual pay
- £48,171
- Exposure score ?
- 0.2/10 Minimal 4.0/10 Moderate strict reading · with tools is 4.0/10 with-tools reading · strict is 0.2/10
- Wage exposure
- £19m £385m
Higher exposure than 15% of the 379 UK occupations we scored.
What this score means
Most of this role's work is still genuinely hard for AI to do. Physical presence, bodily skill, high-context judgment, direct human care - the things that don't translate to text.
If you're in this role, here's what to do now
You're not in the firing line today. But the frontier moves. Build enough AI fluency now that you can direct it for the parts of your work that could benefit. People in unexposed roles who understand AI become unusually valuable inside their organisations.
A meaningful slice of the task inventory is AI-reachable - the drafting, summarising, research and analysis parts especially. This role is at the point where the people who learn to direct AI well pull ahead of the people who don't.
If you're in this role, here's what to do now
Treat AI as a colleague you manage, not a tool you use. Identify the tasks where you'd describe the work to a capable junior - those are the tasks AI can do for you now. Spend your time on the judgment calls and the relationships instead.
Where a project with Alex usually starts for this role
This role's strict reading is low because its top tasks are judgment, not drafting. The three highest-stakes tasks below are still usually where we start — flip the toggle to 'With tools' to see what AI plus the right context can compress.
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Adhere to safety practices and procedures, such as checking equipment regularly and erecting barriers around work areas.
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Drive vehicles equipped with tools and materials to job sites.
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Open switches or attach grounding devices to remove electrical hazards from disturbed or fallen lines or to facilitate repairs.
Most roles have at least three wedges where AI plus the right tools removes real time. For this role the labelling doesn't surface obvious ones, so we'd start with the highest-stakes tasks below and figure out the AI angle in conversation.
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Adhere to safety practices and procedures, such as checking equipment regularly and erecting barriers around work areas.
-
Drive vehicles equipped with tools and materials to job sites.
-
Open switches or attach grounding devices to remove electrical hazards from disturbed or fallen lines or to facilitate repairs.
Every role has three or four wedges like these. Finding them takes an hour. Turning them into a workflow your team actually uses takes a few days. Talk to Alex about a project →
The full task breakdown
Every O*NET task for this occupation, split by what AI can already do unaided versus what still needs a human. Importance is O*NET's 1–5 rating of how central each task is to the role.
Tasks via O*NET "Electrical Power-Line Installers and Repairers" (49-9051.00).
What AI can already do
0 of 23 tasks · unaided
No tasks here are labelled as something an LLM can do unaided. Switch to 'With tools' above to see what changes when AI is paired with the right context.
Where humans still hold the line
23 of 23 tasks
Adhere to safety practices and procedures, such as checking equipment regularly and erecting barriers around work areas.
Drive vehicles equipped with tools and materials to job sites.
Open switches or attach grounding devices to remove electrical hazards from disturbed or fallen lines or to facilitate repairs.
Climb poles or use truck-mounted buckets to access equipment.
Install, maintain, and repair electrical distribution and transmission systems, including conduits, cables, wires, and related equipment, such as transformers, circuit breakers, and switches.
Inspect and test power lines and auxiliary equipment to locate and identify problems, using reading and testing instruments.
Coordinate work assignment preparation and completion with other workers.
Replace or straighten damaged poles.
String wire conductors and cables between poles, towers, trenches, pylons, and buildings, setting lines in place and using winches to adjust tension.
Attach cross-arms, insulators, and auxiliary equipment to poles prior to installing them.
Dig holes, using augers, and set poles, using cranes and power equipment.
Travel in trucks, helicopters, and airplanes to inspect lines for freedom from obstruction and adequacy of insulation.
Identify defective sectionalizing devices, circuit breakers, fuses, voltage regulators, transformers, switches, relays, or wiring, using wiring diagrams and electrical-testing instruments.
Install watt-hour meters and connect service drops between power lines and consumers' facilities.
Test conductors, according to electrical diagrams and specifications, to identify corresponding conductors and to prevent incorrect connections.
Place insulating or fireproofing materials over conductors and joints.
Splice or solder cables together or to overhead transmission lines, customer service lines, or street light lines, using hand tools, epoxies, or specialized equipment.
Trim trees that could be hazardous to the functioning of cables or wires.
Clean, tin, and splice corresponding conductors by twisting ends together or by joining ends with metal clamps and soldering connections.
Pull up cable by hand from large reels mounted on trucks.
Lay underground cable directly in trenches, or string it through conduit running through the trenches.
Cut trenches for laying underground cables, using trenchers and cable plows.
Cut and peel lead sheathing and insulation from defective or newly installed cables and conduits prior to splicing.
Tasks via O*NET "Electrical Power-Line Installers and Repairers" (49-9051.00).
What AI can already do
0 of 23 tasks · with tools
Even with tools, no tasks here are labelled as something AI can do today. The work is judgment, presence, or context-heavy enough that the academic labelling sees no leverage.
Where humans still hold the line
23 of 23 tasks
Adhere to safety practices and procedures, such as checking equipment regularly and erecting barriers around work areas.
Drive vehicles equipped with tools and materials to job sites.
Open switches or attach grounding devices to remove electrical hazards from disturbed or fallen lines or to facilitate repairs.
Climb poles or use truck-mounted buckets to access equipment.
Install, maintain, and repair electrical distribution and transmission systems, including conduits, cables, wires, and related equipment, such as transformers, circuit breakers, and switches.
Inspect and test power lines and auxiliary equipment to locate and identify problems, using reading and testing instruments.
Coordinate work assignment preparation and completion with other workers.
Replace or straighten damaged poles.
String wire conductors and cables between poles, towers, trenches, pylons, and buildings, setting lines in place and using winches to adjust tension.
Attach cross-arms, insulators, and auxiliary equipment to poles prior to installing them.
Dig holes, using augers, and set poles, using cranes and power equipment.
Travel in trucks, helicopters, and airplanes to inspect lines for freedom from obstruction and adequacy of insulation.
Identify defective sectionalizing devices, circuit breakers, fuses, voltage regulators, transformers, switches, relays, or wiring, using wiring diagrams and electrical-testing instruments.
Install watt-hour meters and connect service drops between power lines and consumers' facilities.
Test conductors, according to electrical diagrams and specifications, to identify corresponding conductors and to prevent incorrect connections.
Place insulating or fireproofing materials over conductors and joints.
Splice or solder cables together or to overhead transmission lines, customer service lines, or street light lines, using hand tools, epoxies, or specialized equipment.
Trim trees that could be hazardous to the functioning of cables or wires.
Clean, tin, and splice corresponding conductors by twisting ends together or by joining ends with metal clamps and soldering connections.
Pull up cable by hand from large reels mounted on trucks.
Lay underground cable directly in trenches, or string it through conduit running through the trenches.
Cut trenches for laying underground cables, using trenchers and cable plows.
Cut and peel lead sheathing and insulation from defective or newly installed cables and conduits prior to splicing.
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Methodology
This role's exposure score comes from Eloundou et al's 2023 GPT task labels, aggregated by O*NET importance within each O*NET-SOC code, then bridged to UK SOC 2020 via ISCO-08 (ONS Vol 2 coding index) and US SOC 2010 (BLS crosswalk). Employment and median pay come from ONS ASHE Table 14.7a, 2025 provisional. ASHE covers employees only, so self-employed workers are not counted.
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