Periodic Reporting for period 1 - DIALOGUES (Inclusive DIALOGUES towards an operational concept of energy citizenship to support the Energy Union)
Okres sprawozdawczy: 2021-05-01 do 2022-10-31
The goal of DIALOGUES is to support the objectives of the Energy Union with operational research on the overarching topic of ‘energy citizenship’ that enables citizens’ central role in the uptake of low-carbon energy solutions and links all four strategic priorities: decarbonising buildings, renewables uptake, energy storage, and sustainable mobility. To reach this goal, the practical objective of DIALOGUES is to operationalize, contextualize, measure, and support the framework environments, policies, and institutions that allow deep, inclusive energy citizenship to emerge. Thereby, DIALOGUES aims at the elaboration of the knowledge needed to harness the concept of energy citizenship for targeted policymaking to strengthen the role and efficacy of energy citizenship as a contributor to the strategic priorities of the sustainable energy transition.
Rather than focusing on specific behavioral changes or new technologies, our project recognizes that transformative energy system changes must become embedded in people’s daily decisions. Citizens evaluate trade-offs between competing goals and co-benefits, and thus it is important that organic citizen-driven innovation, investment, lifestyle changes, and collective action are able to manifest in many different ways within the household/community, municipal/regional, and national/supra-national contexts. DIALOGUES aims to achieve these overall goals by providing answers to the following nine objectives:
- Develop an inter- and trans-disciplinary definition of ‘energy citizenship’ and DIALOGUES’ common research agenda.
- Co-create a functional indicator for the degree and mode of energy citizenship.
- Encompass the various strategic priorities and topical areas of citizen engagement under the unifying concept of energy citizenship, including mapping probable pathways and the life-cycle timing between modes of engagement
- Analyse if energy citizenship is more likely to emerge locally, or at regional, national or supranational levels and for what reasons.
- Compare the relative importance of internal social processes and external factors to energy citizenship.
- Explore the impact of digitalisation on energy citizenship.
- Engage citizens in a co-creating the way towards deeper, inclusive energy citizenship
- Make energy citizenship an understandable and useful concept for policymakers and central actors at all levels.
- Keep the focus on inclusive and energy-just concepts of energy citizenship that respects the role of gender, socio-cultural norms/regulations, socio-economic status, geographic location, and group dynamics in shaping a persons’ place in, and preferences for, the future energy system.
Rather than focusing on specific behavioral changes or new technologies, our project recognizes that transformative energy system changes must become embedded in people’s daily decisions. Citizens evaluate trade-offs between competing goals and co-benefits, and thus it is important that organic citizen-driven innovation, investment, lifestyle changes, and collective action are able to manifest in many different ways within the household/community, municipal/regional, and national/supra-national contexts. DIALOGUES aims to achieve these overall goals by providing answers to the following nine objectives:
- Develop an inter- and trans-disciplinary definition of ‘energy citizenship’ and DIALOGUES’ common research agenda.
- Co-create a functional indicator for the degree and mode of energy citizenship.
- Encompass the various strategic priorities and topical areas of citizen engagement under the unifying concept of energy citizenship, including mapping probable pathways and the life-cycle timing between modes of engagement
- Analyse if energy citizenship is more likely to emerge locally, or at regional, national or supranational levels and for what reasons.
- Compare the relative importance of internal social processes and external factors to energy citizenship.
- Explore the impact of digitalisation on energy citizenship.
- Engage citizens in a co-creating the way towards deeper, inclusive energy citizenship
- Make energy citizenship an understandable and useful concept for policymakers and central actors at all levels.
- Keep the focus on inclusive and energy-just concepts of energy citizenship that respects the role of gender, socio-cultural norms/regulations, socio-economic status, geographic location, and group dynamics in shaping a persons’ place in, and preferences for, the future energy system.
Work on DIALOGUES started with establishing the state-of-the-art of energy citizenship research by conducting a comprehensive, interdisciplinary literature review on the subject and preparing the ground for the development of a common research agenda for the project. The results of this first step were presented in the first version of the ‘Integrated Research White Paper (D2.1)’ and in the ‘Comprehensive, interdisciplinary report on energy citizenship’ (D2.2). Building on these results, the next step was to approach the operationalization of energy citizenship by developing indicators for the Energy Citizenship Assessment Tool (ECAT) which allows the assessment of energy citizenship in 10 major areas and sub-dimensions. The report on ‘Operational and inclusive energy citizenship’ (D2.3) provides a set of survey questions for assessing citizens’ status in the energy citizenship nexus, and the corresponding methodology to transform their answers into a multidimensional indicator.
The analysis of energy citizenship was deepened by focusing on contextualizing it in different key dimensions: from a legal and regulatory perspective (D3.1) to collective and political dynamics, power, and efficacy at various geo-political levels (D3.2) by looking at deterrents and enables that support a just energy transition (D3.3) and by assessing the role of digitalization (D3.4).
DIALOGUES aims at building on existing knowledge and thus a further key activity in the first project period was to assemble and curate all relevant data from DIALOGUES partners and supporters as well as from previous projects. Therewith, we aim to provide underlying information and data sources to researchers, policymakers, and the public to assess energy citizenship (D4.1). Regarding the collection and curation of data and further underlying information on energy citizenship, the team developed the first part of the DIALOGUES Knowledge platform: the project’s survey tool, which is now fully operational (http://www.dialogues.site D5.1).
Among the key achievements of the first project period is the comparative analysis of the 80 semi-structured in-depth interviews with politicians and ‘expert’ stakeholders in local energy systems done by the DIALOGUES team in 8 countries. They support our understanding of why local citizens are engaging (or not) with the energy transition and energy initiatives (D5.2).
Central to the project are the Citizen Action Labs, which we established in 8 countries and on a wide variety of topics. Planning their design and coordinating all partners (D5.3) developing recruitment strategies (D6.1) implementing them and assessing the first results (D6.2) was the core activity of the team in the first 18 months of the project.
Our activities, assessments and results are discussed at regular intervals with our policy advisory group, in which six external experts from different institutions support our work by giving us feedback, context and direction for further results.
Cross-cutting through all the activities mentioned above, is DIALOGUES focus on gender and diversity as a particularly relevant analytical category in all aspects and phases of the project. The analysis of inclusivity and gender is built into the core of our research ambition. To achieve this core objective of our project, we took specific actions, among them conducting a dedicated literature research, internal webinars and establishing rules and guidelines for gender-sensitive outreach.
All activities in the project were supported by a comprehensive dissemination and communication strategy (D7.1 D7.2) the establishment of a website, communication materials, newsletters, a video and social media channels.
The analysis of energy citizenship was deepened by focusing on contextualizing it in different key dimensions: from a legal and regulatory perspective (D3.1) to collective and political dynamics, power, and efficacy at various geo-political levels (D3.2) by looking at deterrents and enables that support a just energy transition (D3.3) and by assessing the role of digitalization (D3.4).
DIALOGUES aims at building on existing knowledge and thus a further key activity in the first project period was to assemble and curate all relevant data from DIALOGUES partners and supporters as well as from previous projects. Therewith, we aim to provide underlying information and data sources to researchers, policymakers, and the public to assess energy citizenship (D4.1). Regarding the collection and curation of data and further underlying information on energy citizenship, the team developed the first part of the DIALOGUES Knowledge platform: the project’s survey tool, which is now fully operational (http://www.dialogues.site D5.1).
Among the key achievements of the first project period is the comparative analysis of the 80 semi-structured in-depth interviews with politicians and ‘expert’ stakeholders in local energy systems done by the DIALOGUES team in 8 countries. They support our understanding of why local citizens are engaging (or not) with the energy transition and energy initiatives (D5.2).
Central to the project are the Citizen Action Labs, which we established in 8 countries and on a wide variety of topics. Planning their design and coordinating all partners (D5.3) developing recruitment strategies (D6.1) implementing them and assessing the first results (D6.2) was the core activity of the team in the first 18 months of the project.
Our activities, assessments and results are discussed at regular intervals with our policy advisory group, in which six external experts from different institutions support our work by giving us feedback, context and direction for further results.
Cross-cutting through all the activities mentioned above, is DIALOGUES focus on gender and diversity as a particularly relevant analytical category in all aspects and phases of the project. The analysis of inclusivity and gender is built into the core of our research ambition. To achieve this core objective of our project, we took specific actions, among them conducting a dedicated literature research, internal webinars and establishing rules and guidelines for gender-sensitive outreach.
All activities in the project were supported by a comprehensive dissemination and communication strategy (D7.1 D7.2) the establishment of a website, communication materials, newsletters, a video and social media channels.
The second half of DIALOGUES will focus on several key activities: firstly, the Citizen Action Labs will continue and their comparative assessment will be a central part of the final results we aim to provide. Secondly, we aim to present all of our results in an accessible way to all interested parties by establishing the DIALOGUES Knowledge Platform and by developing new assessment tools. Furthermore, data and information collection activities will be intensified to achieve DIALOGUES goal of integrating as many citizens as possible in our research activities. Our interdisciplinary, academic work will result in the final version of the integrated research white paper, in which we will present our key findings on the topic of energy citizenship. And finally, the next 18 months of the project will be devoted to dissemination, both by publishing our results widely and in different ways to attract differences audiences and by presenting them in conferences and webinars.