Roundtable discussion

1. Who to bring together around how big a table? Identifying, mapping, and engaging stakeholders in the energy transition

Organizer:
Timothy Marcroft (Western Norway University of Applied Sciences, Norway)

Panel members:

You can register for this roundtable by sending us an email at ICNP2023 rug.nl

Every person, organization, initiative, plant, and animal needs energy in some form. The energy transition, and the related issue of climate change, affect everyone and everything. This makes the list of possible stakeholders on any given issue in the energy transition limitless. As researchers, practitioners, public servants, and elected officials, how do we then decide who or what is considered on the list of those "who can affect or who is affected by (Freeman, 1984)” the changes being proposed or even forced upon some groups? In addition, once we have circumscribed this group of stakeholders, how do we understand the interconnections within it, as well as between its members and the outside world? The importance of this question in creating a just energy transition is critical, since only including those with the power to impact transition dynamics and not those who will mostly be subject to them risks recreating historical patterns of injustice and reducing our chances to arrive at a socially sustainable transition. As the saying goes, “If you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu.” This roundtable topic would invite contributions on both academic methodologies for identifying and mapping stakeholders to better engage them, as well as operational knowledge and experience from the worlds of public actors, citizen groups, NGOs, and companies.

2. Challenges and policy recommendations for Just Energy Transition in EU

Organizer:
Alessandro Sciullo (UNITO, Italy)
Joint Programme e3s (clean Energy tranSition for Sustainable Society) of the European Energy Research Alliance - EERA

Panel members:

1. Ganna Gadlkyh (European Energy Research Alliance, EERA, Belgium)
2. Witold Poganietz, (Karlsrhue Institute of Technology, KIT, Germany)
3. Giuseppe Pellegrini (Norwegian University of Science and Technology, NTNU, Norway)
4. Rita Vasconcellos D'Oliveira Bouman (SINTEF, Norway)
5. Ramazan Sari (Technical University of Denmark, DTU, Denmark)

You can register for this roundtable by sending us an email at ICNP2023 rug.nl

For JET to be fostered in the EU context, it needs to be supported by adequate policies that should be able to address the many diverse dimensions of justice and the many diverse social and institutional contexts resulting from the heterogeneity of the EU landscape and the historical evolution of the context themselves

Energy system transformations in fact are complex socio-technical processes involving not only changes to energy technologies but also to the broader social and economic aspects of energy production and consumption. These energy transformations could negatively affect the people that they pursue to serve, exacerbating current vulnerabilities and creating new ones. Therefore, striving for a more equitable distribution of benefits and burdens and ensuring that vulnerable groups are not disproportionately harmed is increasingly seen as a crucial success factor for a just transition. On these premises, the Joint Programme EERA - e3s (clean Energy tranSition for a Sustainable Society) released a white paper on Just Energy Transition (JET) addressing both theoretical and policy challenges for the justice dimension to be properly considered and implemented in the EU energy transition pathways. Within the white paper, JET is intended in the exclusive sense of the European socioeconomic and environmental consequences and their ethical implications of transitioning from fossil fuels to sustainable energy sources.

The white paper (and the proposed round table) is structured in four sections aimed at answering to as many questions.

• Question 1: what is JET and why is needed?
• Question 2: What are the main challenges towards achieving a JET in Europe?
• Question 3: What are the current EU policies addressing JET?
• Question 4: Which policies to steer the JET in EU?