Exploring Values of Energy Justice: A Case Study of a Burgeoning Energy Community

TY - GEN

T1 - Exploring Values of Energy Justice

T2 - 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI 2023

AU - Jensen, Victor Vadmand

AU - Jensen, Rikke Hagensby

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2023 Owner/Author.

PY - 2023/4/19

Y1 - 2023/4/19

N2 - We increasingly see local community energy initiatives unfold to support sustainable energy transitions. The notion of energy communities may aid these initiatives as HCI researchers, practitioners, and political organizations argue for their potential benefits. However, envisionments of energy communities carry assumed expectations of a just energy future for community members. This paper presents a case study of a burgeoning energy community where diverse stakeholders reflect on their expectations of a newly established Danish energy cooperative. Through a value-sensitive design study, we identify ten values reflecting social-technical expectations of how the community may be organized and supported by technology in the future. We structure the values into three tenets of energy justice to discuss value tensions regarding the; i) distribution of energy community benefits and threats, ii) enabling energy community engagement, and iii) recognizing the energy community. Lastly, we discuss how HCI may steer technology design toward a just energy future.

AB - We increasingly see local community energy initiatives unfold to support sustainable energy transitions. The notion of energy communities may aid these initiatives as HCI researchers, practitioners, and political organizations argue for their potential benefits. However, envisionments of energy communities carry assumed expectations of a just energy future for community members. This paper presents a case study of a burgeoning energy community where diverse stakeholders reflect on their expectations of a newly established Danish energy cooperative. Through a value-sensitive design study, we identify ten values reflecting social-technical expectations of how the community may be organized and supported by technology in the future. We structure the values into three tenets of energy justice to discuss value tensions regarding the; i) distribution of energy community benefits and threats, ii) enabling energy community engagement, and iii) recognizing the energy community. Lastly, we discuss how HCI may steer technology design toward a just energy future.

KW - energy communities

KW - energy justice

KW - qualitative case study

KW - sustainable HCI

KW - value tensions

KW - value-sensitive design

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85158129880&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1145/3544549.3573864

DO - 10.1145/3544549.3573864

M3 - Article in proceedings

AN - SCOPUS:85158129880

T3 - Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - Proceedings

BT - CHI 2023 - Extended Abstracts of the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

PB - Association for Computing Machinery, Inc.

Y2 - 23 April 2023 through 28 April 2023

ER -