Explaining inclusivity in energy transitions: Local and community energy in Aotearoa New Zealand

Abstract

International literature on citizen, local and community energy (LCE) has grown exponentially but has focussed on European and North American context. This paper contributes to understanding inclusivity in country-specific energy transition pathways, setting out an empirical analysis of grassroots energy innovation practices in a country that has to date followed an incumbent-led energy transition pathway – Aotearoa (New Zealand). A groundswell of emerging LCE initiatives face protracted feasibility stages and high failure rates, primarily due to lack of market access and risk exposure, and a lack of policy co-ordination and streamlining, with no popularised articulation of a collective energy transition strategy as such. Barring changes in discourse, regulation, and institutional arrangements, future LCE development is likely to be oriented primarily to accommodate utility-scale renewable energy through energy efficiency and demand side management. Within this unsupportive regime context however, we observe uniquely resourced forms of LCE, and identify strategies and policies for a more inclusive pathway. Our findings reveal the limits of grassroots agency and the dependence of wider diffusion of LCE on an enabling institutional context, suggesting there are understudied transition pathways in which opportunities for LCE are relatively constrained.