Speaker
Description
Achieving fair and inclusive urban energy transitions is a pressing societal challenge, particularly in the context of the ongoing climate and energy crisis. These transitions extend beyond technical upgrades or infrastructural changes; they necessitate a rethinking of social relations, governance models and economic structures. While concepts and frameworks such as Energy Communities and Positive Energy Districts (PEDs) emphasize the neighbourhood scale and integrated transformations of energy systems and living conditions, recent research highlights that energy injustices often remain underaddressed. In particular, there are fundamental challenges in addressing complex and interrelated injustices in underprivileged inner-city neighbourhoods. Residents of these neighborhoods frequently face energy injustices due to high costs and limited access to renewable energy services.Moreover, structural injustices undermine engagement for collective action and diminish community cooperation (McNamara et al., 2013), depriving inhabitants of the necessary resources and opportunities to develop their capabilities (Gaupp et al., 2023). These factors can act as barriers for collective energy transformations.
In response, energy justice has gained increasing attention in recent years, emphasizing the need for fair distribution of benefits and burdens in energy production and consumption, inclusive public participation in energy decision-making, and the recognition of diverse perspectives rooted in social, cultural, ethnic, racial, and gender differences (Feenstra & Özerol, 2021). While energy justice provides a valuable analytical framework for institutional processes and policy discourse, it predominantly emphasizes individual responsibility and rights-based approaches to justice (Damgaard et al., 2022).
Scholars and practitioners have called for more inclusive, creative, and participatory approaches to broaden voices and visions in energy futures, engaging more directly with everyday lived experiences. Recently, storytelling has been increasingly recognized as a useful tool for envisioning just energy futures, particularly in its ability to engage diverse voices such as policymakers, community members, activists, and other groups of population directly affected by energy decisions (Dahlgren et al., 2024; Moezzi et al., 2017). Storytelling offers a way to uncover experiences, practices, emotions, and meanings associated with energy, leading to a deeper appreciation of its sociotechnical nature (Staddon, 2017). It also ignites people’s imagination and broadens perspectives on future possibilities (Hajer & Versteeg, 2019) and has the potential to unite people and strengthen community processes (Sol Cueva, 2025). Thus, methods focusing on narrative approaches can allow researchers to pose alternative questions, focus on neglected issues, and include marginalized perspectives.
This contribution explores the potential of storytelling and narrative mapping methods as a means to engage with everyday experiences of energy vulnerability and diverse community perspectives on energy systems and transitions. Moreover, we explore how storytelling can be deployed to bridge the gap between local needs and experiences and governmental and institutional stakeholders. Drawing on feminist theories of care and care ethics, we aim to explore how storytelling can challenge the individualistic framing of energy concerns, and can serve as a powerful tool for democratizing energy transition discourses by revealing how energy is deeply interwoven with everyday practices, emotions, and aspirations. To do so we draw on empirical work conducted in a neighbourhood in Ghent, Belgium, exploring different ways to build collective storylines based on how individuals and community organisations encounter energy in their daily lives and how they assess its role in shaping their lived experiences (Smith & High, 2017). Moreover, we reflect on the potential to increase energy literacy and foster collective action.
References
Dahlgren, K., Kaviani, F., Strengers, Y., Pink, S., & Korsmeyer, H. (2024). Bringing energy futures to life: Anticipatory household storylines as possible energy futures. Futures, 158, 103347.
Damgaard, C. S., McCauley, D., & Reid, L. (2022). Towards energy care ethics: Exploring ethical implications of relationality within energy systems in transition. Energy Research & Social Science, 84, 102356. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.erss.2021.102356
Feenstra, M., & Özerol, G. (2021). Energy justice as a search light for gender-energy nexus: Towards a conceptual framework. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 138, 110668.
Gaupp, F., Constantino, S., & Pereira, L. (2023). The role of agency in social tipping processes [Preprint]. Sustainability science/Human/Earth system interactions/Other methods. https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2023-1533
Hajer, M., & Versteeg, W. (2019). Imagining the post-fossil city: why is it so difficult to think of new possible worlds?. Territory, Politics, Governance, 7(2), 122-134.
McNamara, N., Stevenson, C., & Muldoon, O. T. (2013). Community identity as resource and context: A mixed method investigation of coping and collective action in a disadvantaged community. European Journal of Social Psychology, 43(5), 393–403. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.1953
Moezzi, M., Janda, K. B., & Rotmann, S. (2017). Using stories, narratives, and storytelling in energy and climate change research. Energy Research & Social Science, 31, 1-10.
Sol Cueva, L. (2025). Tell me an (un)fortunate story: Advancing storytelling methods in energy futures research. Futures, 165, 103505.
Smith, J., & High, M. M. (2017). Exploring the anthropology of energy: Ethnography, energy and ethics. Energy Research & Social Science, 30, 1-6.
Staddon, S. (2017). Reflecting on personal and professional energy stories in energy demand research. Energy research & social science, 31, 158-163.
| Keywords | Positive Energy Districts; energy vulnerability; energy injustice; storytelling; narrative mapping |
|---|---|
| Best Congress Paper Award | No |
