A Governance Approach to Regional Energy Transition: Meaning, Conceptualization and Practice

Thomas Hoppe,Michiel Miedema

doi:10.3390/su12030915

Abstract

Energy transition requires action from different levels of government. While the national and local level have received ample scholarly attention, thus far little attention has been paid to the regional level. This is remarkable because policy makers across Europe are wondering what governance of regional transition actually is and how to shape and implement it. In the present paper, this concern is addressed. The research questions are, “What does regional governance of energy transition entail? How can it be conceptualized? And what does it mean in practice?” The questions are answered by presenting the results of a multi-disciplinary literature study, presenting a conceptual framework on governance of regional energy transition, using insights from innovation and transition studies as well as from the regional and network governance literature, and applying this to the illustrative case of the West-Brabant region in The Netherlands. West-Brabant is a relatively large region and was home to a pilot that involved the development of a regional energy strategy. Data collection involved twenty expert interviews, text documents and participative observation in workshops. Results highlight the relevance of each of the key elements of the conceptual governance framework. However, some are particularly relevant like structural characteristics of the regional actor network, actor characteristics, and regional governance arrangements used. The results reveal commonalities with regional governance in other policy domains. This paper contributes to the literature on polycentric governance of energy transition and climate change mitigation, and concludes with the presentation of a research agenda.

Highlights

Regional energy transition (RET) [1] is a topic that is receiving increasing attention from policy makers across Europe
Key events pertaining to the formation of RET strategy in the WB region and key regional energy transition projects are presented that can be seen as contributing to RET in the period of 2016–2018
It is municipalities that report this problem, and other actors like energy suppliers, regional grid operators and housing associations who claim that lack of educated, skilled staff limits their operations in energy transition projects

Summary

Introduction

Regional energy transition (RET) [1] is a topic that is receiving increasing attention from policy makers across Europe. Local administrations—currently typically large-sized municipalities with experienced staff and with sufficient capacities—formulate and run progressive programs, while taking on different roles, from initiator to regulator and facilitator, depending on the degree of authority they have vis-à-vis national government [3,4,5,6]. In this way, national government sets the governance conditions and supportive policy instrumentation that local administrations can use, tailoring their programs and policies to local conditions, with the aim to meet low carbon goals (and co-benefits) and contribute to the climate mitigation goals of national government. While this model makes sense theoretically, in practice, it is suboptimal, because it leaves out an important territorial level in between the national and local level: the regional level

Results

Discussion

Conclusion