Energy justice is increasingly being used as a framework to conceptualize the impacts of energy decision making in more holistic ways and to consider the social implications in terms of existing ethical values. Similarly, renewable energy technologies are increasingly being promoted for their environmental and social benefits. However, little work has been done to systematically examine the extent to which, in what ways and in what contexts, renewable energy technologies can contribute to achieving energy justice. This paper assesses the potential of renewable electricity technologies to address energy justice in various global contexts via a systematic review of existing studies analyzed in terms of the principles and dimensions of energy justice. Based on publications including peer reviewed academic literature, books, and in some cases reports by government or international organizations, we assess renewable electricity technologies in both grid integrated and off-grid use contexts. We conduct our investigation through the rubric of the affirmative and prohibitive principles of energy justice and in terms of its temporal, geographic, socio-political, economic, and technological dimensions. Renewable electricity technology development has and continue to have different impacts in different social contexts, and by considering the different impacts explicitly across global contexts, including differences between rural and urban contexts, this paper contributes to identifying and understanding how, in what ways, and in what particular conditions and circumstances renewable electricity technologies may correspond with or work to promote energy justice.

Energy production from fossil fuels is gradually phased out as many countries aim to transition to a low-carbon society. As society and technology are intertwined, phasing out fossil fuels impacts people and communities. Especially those who heavily rely on the fossil fuel industry will be worse off. Therefore, calls are being made for ajust transitionthat ensures the rehabilitation of workers, regions, and communities negatively affected by fossil fuel industry closures. We argue that spatial justice can help inform just transition’s theoretical and practical aspects. Therefore, a spatial justice approach should be a prerequisite for a just transition. The concept of spatial justice is intertwined with the social justice principles of procedural, distributive, and restorative justice, which are central to the current conceptual understanding of just transition. We use the case of the closure of peat-based electricity production in rural Ireland to demonstrate how a spatial justice approach can underpin a just transition and how it can help with practicalities like identifying and addressing the issues and concerns in local communities. To ensure a just transition, a spatial justice approach is needed to identify and address the deeper problems affecting the resiliency of rural and mono-industrial regions dependent on fossil fuels.

The United Nations 2030 Agenda emphasizes the importance of multistakeholder partnerships for achieving the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Indeed, Goal 17 includes a target for national governments to promote multistakeholder partnerships between state and non-state actors. In this paper, we explore how members of civil society organizations and the private sector perceive both the possibilities and challenges of multistakeholder partnerships evolving in Ireland for achieving the SDGs. The research uses data gathered during 2018 and includes documentary research, participant observations of stakeholder forums in Ireland and the United Nations, and semi-structured interviews to address related questions. The results demonstrate that numerous challenges exist for forming multistakeholder partnerships for the SDGs, including a fragmented understanding of the Goals. They also note previous examples of successful multistakeholder partnership models, the need for more leadership from government, and an overly goal-based focus on SDG implementation by organizations as major impediments to following a multistakeholder partnership approach in the country. These findings suggest that although Goal 17 identifies multistakeholder partnerships as essential for the SDGs, they are challenging to form and require concerted actions from all state and non-state actors for SDG implementation.

Urgent political action is required to arrest the rise in global temperature within the 1.5°C target of the Paris Agreement. Rising to this challenge, a series of Just Transition Energy Partnerships (JETPs) was launched between individual Global South and a group of Global North countries since COP 26 in Glasgow. Germany, France, the United Kingdom, the United States, and the European Union (International Partner Group or IPG countries) have established plurilateral partnerships with individual countries like South Africa, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Senegal in each JETP. These partnerships aim to help IPG countries provide long-term support to partner countries in the Global South to disengage from coal and convert to renewables for electricity generation. However, though ’just transitions’ and ’partnerships’ are potent ideas to drive such processes, it is challenging to translate these ideas from political rhetoric to policies. This paper argues that JETPs are treading on a narrow edge with a high chance of re-instantiating some of the criticism of partnerships between Global North and Global South countries that can detrimentally affect the chances of just transition. Based on academic literature on partnerships and just transition, the paper concludes that the devil lies in the details. Formalizing processes that deliver a just and fair energy transition should align with the Global South countries’ social, economic, and political realities.