Energía y bienestar: una breve historia desde la perspectiva de los límites medioambientales

Energy: vital and fatal. Vital because a certain amount of energy has become indispensable for modern individuals and societies. Fatal because energy systems have produced the largest proportion of greenhouse gases since at least the second half of the twentieth century. Thus, it is essential to analyse energy issues from the point of view of its use, trying to answer questions such as: How much energy is required to maintain or improve levels of human well-being? Which countries have managed to achieve high levels of well-being with relatively low levels of energy use, and how? What impact does our understanding of human well-being have on how we think about the relationship between this and energy? This article presents the history of the study of the relationship between energy and well-being, imperative in the fight to mitigate climate change, from the perspective of environmental limits.Energía: vital y fatal. Vital pues cierta cantidad de energía se ha convertido en un aspecto indispensable para las sociedades y personas modernas. Fatal pues los sistemas energéticos han generado la mayor parte de las emisiones de gases efecto invernadero desde por lo menos la segunda mitad del siglo veinte. Por lo tanto, es indispensable analizar las cuestiones de energía desde el punto de vista de su uso buscando responder preguntas como ¿cuánta energía se requiere para mantener o mejorar niveles de bienestar humano?, ¿qué países han logrado alcanzar niveles altos de bienestar con niveles relativamente bajos de uso de la energía y cómo lo han logrado?, ¿qué impacto tiene nuestra comprensión del bienestar humano en cómo reflexionamos sobre la relación entre energía y bienestar? Este artículo tiene como objetivo presentar la historia del estudio de las relaciones energía-bienestar imperativa en la lucha por mitigar el cambio climático, desde una perspectiva de límites medioambientales

Are citizen juries and assemblies on climate change driving democratic climate policymaking? An exploration of two case studies in the UK

In light of increasing pressure to deliver climate action targets and the growing role of citizens in raising the importance of the issue, deliberative democratic processes (e.g. citizen juries and citizen assemblies) on climate change are increasingly being used to provide a voice to citizens in climate change decision-making. Through a comparative case study of two processes that ran in the UK in 2019 (the Leeds Climate Change Citizens’ Jury and the Oxford Citizens’ Assembly on Climate Change), this paper investigates how far citizen assemblies and juries are increasing citizen engagement on climate change and creating more citizen-centred climate policymaking. Interviews were conducted with policymakers, councillors, professional facilitators and others involved in running these processes to assess motivations for conducting these, their structure and the impact and influence they had. The findings suggest the impact of these processes is not uniform: they have an indirect impact on policy making by creating momentum around climate action and supporting the introduction of pre-planned or pre-existing policies rather than a direct impact by truly being citizen-centred policy making processes or conducive to new climate policy. We conclude with reflections on how these processes give elected representatives a public mandate on climate change, that they help to identify more nuanced and in-depth public opinions in a fair and informed way, yet it can be challenging to embed citizen juries and assemblies in wider democratic processes

What are the social outcomes of climate policies? A systematic map and review of the ex-post literature

It is critical to ensure climate and energy policies are just, equitable and beneficial for communities, both to sustain public support for decarbonisation and address multifaceted societal challenges. Our objective in this article is to examine the diverse social outcomes that have resulted from climate policies, in varying contexts worldwide, over the past few decades. We review 203 ex-post climate policy assessments that analyse social outcomes in the literature. We systematically and comprehensively map out this work, identifying articles on carbon, energy and transport taxes, feed-in-tariffs, subsidies, direct procurement policies, large renewable deployment projects, and other regulatory and market-based interventions. We code each article in terms of their studied social outcomes and effects, with a focus on electricity access, energy affordability, community cohesion, employment, distributional and equity issues, livelihoods and poverty, procedural justice, subjective well-being and drudgery. Our analysis finds that climate and energy policies often fall short of delivering positive social outcomes. Nonetheless, across country contexts and policy types there are manifold examples of climate policymaking that does deliver on both social and climate goals. This requires attending to distributive and procedural justice in policy design, and making use of appropriate mechanisms to ensure that policy costs and benefits are fairly shared. We emphasize the need to further advance ex-post policy assessments and learn about what policies work for a just transition

What are the social outcomes of climate policies? A systematic map and review of the ex-post literature

It is critical to ensure climate and energy policies are just, equitable and beneficial for communities, both to sustain public support for decarbonisation and address multifaceted societal challenges. Our objective in this article is to examine the diverse social outcomes that have resulted from climate policies, in varying contexts worldwide, over the past few decades. We review 203 ex-post climate policy assessments that analyse social outcomes in the literature. We systematically and comprehensively map out this work, identifying articles on carbon, energy and transport taxes, feed-in-tariffs, subsidies, direct procurement policies, large renewable deployment projects, and other regulatory and market-based interventions. We code each article in terms of their studied social outcomes and effects, with a focus on electricity access, energy affordability, community cohesion, employment, distributional and equity issues, livelihoods and poverty, procedural justice, subjective well-being and drudgery. Our analysis finds that climate and energy policies often fall short of delivering positive social outcomes. Nonetheless, across country contexts and policy types there are manifold examples of climate policymaking that does deliver on both social and climate goals. This requires attending to distributive and procedural justice in policy design, and making use of appropriate mechanisms to ensure that policy costs and benefits are fairly shared. We emphasize the need to further advance ex-post policy assessments and learn about what policies work for a just transition