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Key findings
Across many countries, the renewable energy transition is overlooking people’s needs, rights and agency, repeating the injustices of the fossil fuel era. A just, people-centered transition is the only way to deliver real benefits fast and at scale.
The current energy transition is being shaped by profit-driven agendas, prioritizing corporate gain over people’s rights and needs.
Rich countries (like Canada, Australia, Japan, Germany) and emerging economies (like China and the UAE), together with their corporations, are continuing to engage in extractivist practices in the Global South.
The private-led approach is failing to meet countries’ needs. Across the globe, corporate capture is leading to:
- Export-oriented projects that divert resources needed for domestic action
- ‘Giga’ projects that offer limited local benefits while posing high socio and environmental risks
- Foreign ownership that undermines national energy sovereig
Weak accountability across the value chain leads to widespread human rights violations. Indigenous Peoples, women, workers and vulnerable communities are particularly affected. Nowhere is meaningful engagement with communities yet the norm.
People-centered transitions are already happening worldwide, delivering real benefits.
Whether in Australia, Pakistan, China, Germany or India, residential solar rooftop systems are booming, providing direct benefits to people and easing pressure on lands. Targeted support measures for poorer households, rural areas, and tenants, however, need to be scaled up.
For larger-scale projects, community energy and alternate models of ownership are gaining ground, wherever supportive policies exist. Calls for public ownership are rising.
With adequate policies in place, local and national benefits can be seized, for example through mandatory benefit-sharing agreements and green industrial strategies grounded in justice and equity.
Recommendations
Addressing justice gaps at the international level. Countries must:
- Establish a Just Transition Global Mechanism at COP30 to foster international cooperation around renewable energy and transition minerals.
- Ratify and enforce international conventions to protect workers and communities and hold corporations accountable (e.g., ILO Core Conventions, OECD Due Diligence Guidance).
- Reform the global financial architecture and ensure developed countries deliver public climate finance at scale.
Addressing justice gaps at the national level. Countries must:
- Strengthen legislative and regulatory frameworks to ensure the just deployment of renewable energy projects.
- Support and enable alternate models of financing and ownership, including community-led and distributed renewable energy initiatives, with targeted support measures for vulnerable groups.
- Reclaim local and national socio-economic benefits spurred by renewable energy, e.g., through mandatory benefit-sharing agreements and green industrial policy.
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