Improving Public Participation in a Just Energy Transition in Two Environmental Justice Communities
Buried beneath US cities pipelines transport an invisible threat: flammable natural gas. Country-wide, city gas pipes leak the greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to 3,726,752 cars, damaging vital tree canopies and increasing energy costs. Despite the profound impact this infrastructure has on residents’ lives sociopolitical and technical barriers limit residents’ ability to shape this system. Our study investigates how to improve residents’ agency in the aging natural gas infrastructure and an emerging geothermal alternative—GeoMicroDistricts–through community centered research and learning as civic science.
Done in partnership with researchers at the Social Science Environmental Health Research Institute at Northeastern University and the Clark University Marsh Institute, our study weaves together concerns for natural gas leaks, civic science, and just transition:. Traditional public participation in utility governance is limited to public comments permitting stages, and individual complaints to companies. What are other forms of public participation that could complement a restorative justice to approaches to energy insecurity and a just transition? Can Civic Science enable residents, in particular residents who are low-income and/or people of color, to have greater agency in their city’s transition to clean energy, including increasing their oversight of existing gas infrastructure? In a newer phase of the research, we ask, can the implementation of GeoMicroDistricts (GMDs) pilots also advance energy justice?
Thus far, our work has produced a prototype GIS platform for community observations of gas leaks, open source curriculum modules tying gas leaks detection with the need for just transitions, and a symposium for gas leaks advocacy groups and researchers: Gas Leaks and Energy Justice: A Virtual Conference Linking Civic Science to the Push for a Just Transition.