Energy Transition Contributions for Collective Reflection

The energy transition is making the headlines. Interest in energy transition comes from a range of actors including peoples in resistance, workers, academics, and public administrations, as well as large corporations, international institutions, and governments. The energy transition paradigm, if it exists, runs a serious risk of being co-opted by large companies, of being trivialized and used to perpetuate existing power relations.

This handbook lays out the current debates in order to promote a vision of what a just and necessary peoples’ energy transition should look like.

1. Is there a single vision for energy transition?
2. Why do we need an energy transition?
3. Can there be synergy between food sovereignty and energy transition?
4. Where is energy poverty within the energy transition agenda?
5. Can we create the right to energy?
6. How much energy is available? Is energy unlimited?
7. Is having energy resources or reserves the same as being able to use them?
8. Should unconventional fossil fuels have a role in the energy transition?
9. What is the connection between energy transition and climate change? Does the Paris Agreement contribute to an energy transition?
10. What should the main path be, if we abandon fossil fuels?
11. Can renewable energy sources solve the problem? Are they enough? Can they be developed?
12. What does it look like to promote the development of renewable energy sources through a peoples’ energy transition?
13. How can the trade and investment protection regime affect the energy transition?
14. Do local initiatives present an opportunity? Do they have limits?
15. Will jobs be lost in the energy transition?
16. Are agrofuels an alternative?
17. Are there feminist perspectives on the energy transition?
18. How do institutions view the energy transition?
19. Can a peoples’ energy transition take place without democratisation?