Nathaniel Trumbull (Ph.D., University of Washington)
Associate Professor of Geography, Sustainability, Community and Urban Studies
Rationale
Research demonstrates that offshore wind developments can provide substantial economic benefits, including creation of quality local jobs. However, there are concerns about equitable access to these benefits for host communities. Assessing the distribution of jobs and other projectrelated economic gains through surveys and interviews would provide insights into distributive justice or injustice especially with job opportunities in host communities.
Moreover, procedural justice is key in examining public acceptance and support of renewable energy projects. Evaluating local perceptions of whether planning processes provide opportunities for information (especially on jobs) may reveal procedural justice deficits. Methods, including focus groups and interviews, will allow detailed examination of experiences with engagement around workforce decisions.
Formative policy analysis and collaborative community-based research (like PPGIS) can help produce practical recommendations for enhancing justice in renewable energy developments. Reviewing policies (e.g. Justice40 initiative) at multiple governance levels and company practices, along with codeveloping solutions with host communities, can lead to context-specific strategies to address identified energy injustices. There are also concerns about job quality in offshore wind. For instance, there are arguments that the industry relies heavily on short-term contract labor rather than stable careers, while there are other arguments that with proper policies, offshore wind can create good-paying, full-time jobs with benefits. A rigorous examination of relevant policies to identify the potential and actual influences on the progress and effectiveness of these efforts would help identify and address these injustices.
This rationale grounds the objectives firmly in established concepts of distributive, procedural and recognition justice from the energy justice literature and provide evidence that these are important issues in offshore wind energy projects that merit research efforts.
Fall 2024 Updates