Social sustainability indicators: A comprehensive review with application in the energy sector

Abstract

• Reviews the state of research on social sustainability indicators (SSIs). • Found that SSIs are rarely applied in the energy sector (ES). • Classifies and investigates SSIs for promoting social sustainability in ES. • Reviews key challenges and implications of applying SSIs in ES. • Presents a list of SSIs relevant to ES researchers and practitioners. Sustainability is achieved by fulfilling economic, environmental, and social goals. Until recently, social sustainability indicators had not received much attention in the literature. Social sustainability and its indicators are poorly understood, which makes it somewhat difficult to oversee the design and implementation of sustainability projects. This paper responds to this by investigating Social Sustainability Indicators (SSIs) across many sectors to learn how they could potentially apply to the energy sector, with special attention given to classifying those indicators into energy supply chains (ESCs), stakeholder, and impact levels. It does this by critical reviewing 420 social indicators in the literature and proposing a practical set of categories related to the energy sector. The findings show that the majority of SSIs address the “production” and “demand” stages of ESC. SSIs related to employees are also common, based on stakeholder analysis. The analysis highlighted the importance of internal stakeholders, in particular, in achieving social sustainability. The number of SSIs at the strategic level far exceeds those at the tactical and operational levels. There is no consensus on definitions of SSIs, and, subsequently, there is no agreement on their measurement or the data needed for that purpose. Potential SSIs that may conflict with one another are investigated to identify implementation challenges. The contribution of this paper is classifying the SSIs, identifying the gaps, investigating implementation challenges, discussing implications, and proposing future research directions to promote awareness about renewable energy for better progress towards sustainability.