TY - CHAP
T1 - Problematizing the Just Energy Transition from a Sub-Saharan Africa Context
T2 - Insights from Key Developmental Concepts
AU - Onyango, Vincent
AU - Gazzola, Paola
N1 - © 2024 The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
PY - 2024/2/28
Y1 - 2024/2/28
N2 - The significance and complexity surrounding Just Energy Transition’s (JET) connotations and implementation, especially for Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), is raising concern and agitation for economic development, environmental governance, morality, fairness, and inclusiveness, leading to questions whether global development requires a transformative equity and justice focus. Questioning its universal applicability, this chapter will problematise JET from a SSA context, asking whether JET is a priority in SSA, and if so, what aims, objectives and form it should take. Thus, we consider to what extent we can find alternative alignments between JET and key development concepts, i.e., Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC), Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs (MHN), Sustainable Development Goals, a Human Rights-Based Approach) and one environmental concept (Polluter Pays Principle, or PPP). Based on these development concepts, we highlight areas of concern for which SSA will require deeper context-specific analysis and deliberations, for JET decisions (policies, strategies, objectives). While SSA’s priority is attaining energy self-sufficiency, JET’s aims can primarily be formulated around the three most widely used arguments i.e., EKC, MHN and PPP, while integrating the other two or more concepts as necessary. As SSA countries differ in terms of climate change vulnerability, energy conditions and levels of socio-economic development, interpreting JET will vary by region, country, and community groups, producing many interpretations of what JET policies and strategies may look like at different scales.
AB - The significance and complexity surrounding Just Energy Transition’s (JET) connotations and implementation, especially for Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), is raising concern and agitation for economic development, environmental governance, morality, fairness, and inclusiveness, leading to questions whether global development requires a transformative equity and justice focus. Questioning its universal applicability, this chapter will problematise JET from a SSA context, asking whether JET is a priority in SSA, and if so, what aims, objectives and form it should take. Thus, we consider to what extent we can find alternative alignments between JET and key development concepts, i.e., Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC), Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs (MHN), Sustainable Development Goals, a Human Rights-Based Approach) and one environmental concept (Polluter Pays Principle, or PPP). Based on these development concepts, we highlight areas of concern for which SSA will require deeper context-specific analysis and deliberations, for JET decisions (policies, strategies, objectives). While SSA’s priority is attaining energy self-sufficiency, JET’s aims can primarily be formulated around the three most widely used arguments i.e., EKC, MHN and PPP, while integrating the other two or more concepts as necessary. As SSA countries differ in terms of climate change vulnerability, energy conditions and levels of socio-economic development, interpreting JET will vary by region, country, and community groups, producing many interpretations of what JET policies and strategies may look like at different scales.
KW - Just energy transition
KW - Sub-Saharan Africa
KW - Energy justice
KW - Energy transition
KW - development concepts
U2 - 10.1007/978-3-030-74380-2
DO - 10.1007/978-3-030-74380-2
M3 - Chapter (peer-reviewed)
T3 - Palgrave Studies in Energy Transitions
BT - The Palgrave Handbook of Zero Carbon Energy Systems and Energy Transitions
A2 - Wood, Geoffrey
A2 - Onyango, Vincent
A2 - Yenneti, Komali
A2 - Liakopoulou, Maria Anastasia
PB - Palgrave Macmillan
ER -