A new framework for analysing local participation in community energy initiatives

The Dutch Climate Agreement includes a 50 percent local ownership of energy production target. However, what is meant by “local,” “ownership” and “participation” is not strictly defined in the Agreement. Nevertheless, community energy initiatives are expected to be an integral part of the ‘local ownership’ goals listed in the Agreement. Consequently, there is a need for a robust framework which can capture local nuances, explain the role and degree of citizen participation in different contexts and areas of participation, and that will allow community energy initiatives to benchmark their participation levels in relation to ‘others’ and their own change over time. This paper proposes a new diagnostic framework which conceptualizes participation in the technical, political, and economic dimensions of local energy transitions and that can identify gaps and challenges in community energy initiatives in relation to local participation. We use the Socio-ecological Systems Framework (SESF) as a starting point and enrich the framework’s third and fourth tier variables using Arnstein’s ladder of participation along with other participatory literature. Our framework outlines the key variables for understanding the participatory environment in which participation occurs and links the environment to the levels of participation. The framework provides granularity and flexibility given its multi-tier and decomposable structure. Therefore, supporting gap analysis of local participation and comparison across diverse case