Co-producing energy and climate policies: Justice and equity in sustainability transitions

Justice and equity in sustainable transitions (COJUST) The main goal of the COJUST project is to co-produce energy and climate policies with and for low-income groups in Norway, with the following secondary goals: (1) Recognize and amplify low-income groups' perspectives on measures and policies for sustainability transitions. (2) Understand the social impacts of a range of energy and climate policies and whether these address and attempt to overcome justice and equity challenges. (3) Understand low-income groups' everyday practices within the thematic areas of mobility, housing and consumption patterns (4) Only the wearer knows where the shoe pinches: Understand how to use experiments to provide input to decision makers and to motivate practice changes for all. Our starting point is that sustainable transition processes require deep and far-reaching societal changes where social, environmental and technological aspects must be understood in relation to each other. At the same time, we know that we live in a situation today where rising prices for electricity, food, fuel and housing interest rates dominate the news. The need to create transition processes towards a low-emission society that actively takes into account the principles of justice and equity has therefore never been greater. During the project, we have conducted 22 individual interviews and 14 storytelling workshops with a total of 73 participants from low-income groups in Trondheim, Bergen and Stavanger. In addition, we have analyzed EU, national and municipal climate strategies and plans with the aim of highlighting how justice and inequality perspectives are part of current climate policy and how such considerations can be improved. Our research has pointed to key shortcomings in current climate policy when it comes to creating inclusion and active participation from low-income groups in ongoing transition processes. Current policy has mainly focused on phasing in new low-emission technology (e.g., electric car support and energy efficiency in the home) and has had economically resourceful groups as the main target group. For the low-income groups, it is clear that this policy has had negative social impacts by creating an increased feeling of exclusion from policies based on a lack of ability to invest in new technology. A key message from COJUST therefore concerns the need for greater diversity in Norwegian climate policy, which must combine the focus on technology integration with policies that aim directly at the needs of vulnerable groups. In that context, our research points to the importance of including other professional groups that have not previously been as involved in sustainability work and that are close to low-income groups, such as, e.g., professionals in health care and social services. These should be given an extended mandate when it comes to mapping needs and initiating solutions that can help the low-income groups. At the same time, the project has mapped and made visible a number of practices, knowledge and skills within the low-income groups that may become important in the transition work going forward. Firstly, our findings show the possibilities for reducing emissions and organizing daily life without making large investments in new technology. Secondly, these existing practices point to the fact that there is a type of "invisible" sustainability work that is already carried out by those groups that do not have access to low-emission technologies, and there is a need for these contributions to emission reductions to also be recognized in today's climate policy. This will be central to creating a just transition. Based on the research findings, COJUST has contributed to promoting equity and justice aspects of sustainable transitions in international research and contributed directly to the development of effective and just measures for reduced energy use in the areas of (1) mobility, (2) housing and (3) consumption patterns. COJUST has contributed to the public debate by writing feature articles, being interviewed in Norwegian newspapers and participating in podcasts. An important task in the COJUST project has been co-production to find solutions and measures for low-income groups. In this connection, we have e.g., had three workshops with representatives from private and public sector where we discussed social inequity around the topics of mobility, housing and consumption. These have been published as policy briefs and the research findings have been presented at an open webinar initiated by FME NTRANS. We are experiencing great interest in our research work from the country's municipalities and cities.

COJUST had the following scientific and societal impact: - Through its novel approach of combining the energy justice perspective with a practice theory approach COJUST contributed to new insights regarding the role of low-income groups in sustainability transitions. From merely focusing on the negative consequences of policies on these groups, COJUST contributed to insights about if and how these groups are able to – and prevented from – participating in sustainability transitions. In contrast to common understandings of low-income groups as climate skeptics and in opposition to climate policies, COJUST contributed to a more nuanced understanding by pointing out their wish and willingness to participate in sustainability transitions. In fact, low-income groups perform various everyday practices which make them sustainable citizens. - COJUST’s co-creation approach and novel methodology that combined policy analysis, storytelling workshops and in-depth interviews, contributed to amplify the marginalized voices and stories of low-income groups and made them visible to the work of public administration and policy debates. This has created new ideas for alternative climate policies that benefit rather than burden low-income groups and facilitate their participation in sustainability transitions. - COJUST has also opened for new academic collaboration through focusing on social sustainability in energy and climate transition work. New links between energy/sustainability research and social work have been established which resulted in a collaboration on a textbook on “green social work”. This book focuses on creating a new space for social work in sustainability transitions, where such expertise can play an important role in identifying needs within vulnerable groups and support just transitions. - COJUST built an extensive network of societal actors (municipalities, civil society organizations, and representatives from low-income groups) that participated in project activities. COJUST was, e.g., directly involved in developing the new climate action plan for Bergen and had regular meetings with policy actors in Trondheim, and thereby directly supported the developed of climate policies. COJUST was also mentioned as collaborator for climate-neutral Trondheim (Trondheim is one of EUs “100 climate neutral and smart cities by 2030”). - COJUST also widely disseminated its project results through media interviews, feature articles and social media, which resulted wide interest in the topic and project results as exemplified by the many invitations the COJUST team received to give presentations in different fora. Hence, COJUST contributed to putting the topic of climate policies, social inequity and justice on the public and political agenda and provided a knowledge basis for a long-term strategy for a zero-emission society.

The COJUST project aims to co-produce energy and climate policies with and for low-income groups in Norway. Recognising recent academic and policy calls for just and inclusive sustainability transitions, the project will support the development of effective, equitable and publicly acceptable policies for efficient and/or reduced energy use within the areas of (1) mobility, (2) shelter, and (3) consumption patterns. Through identifying socially just policies that benefit, rather than burden, low-income groups, the project ensures that not only the environmental and economic dimensions, but also the social dimension of sustainability is taken into consideration when designing policies for sustainability transitions. COJUST employs a practice-oriented approach to energy justice and novel methodologies by combining storytelling and living experiments. Thus, the project takes a bottom-up and co-productionist approach to understanding justice and equity in the Norwegian sustainability transition and to achieve the following secondary objectives: (1) To recognise and amplify low-income group views on policies aimed at facilitating sustainability transitions; (2) To understand the possible social impacts of a range of energy and climate mitigation policies und how these policies can overcome social justice challenges; (3) To understand low-income groups everyday practices within the three topic areas mobility, shelter and consumption patterns; and (4) Only the wearer knows where the shoe pinches: To understand how to use experiments to give input for policymakers and to motivate practice changes.