Energy justice

By Dean Hill Rivkin

The United States (and, indeed, the world) is in the midst of yet another energy crisis. These crises come along periodically, often when oil and gas prices are high, or there are electricity shortages or, as is the case now, when there is overwhelming evidence that the world’s voracious consumption of non-renewable energy resources is wreaking havoc with the planet’s environment. In this climate (excuse the pun), experts and politicians pour out of the woodwork to propose technical and political solutions to solve the current problem.
In this process, the voices of effected citizens rarely get heard. This is a scientific or engineering problem, say the experts. Perceptions of ordinary people have little place in the debate. What is also missing is the concept of justice. Some might say injecting as complicated, nuanced, and subjective a concept as justice into the energy discourse would only polarize what is viewed as a hard problem. Soft concepts simply have no place in this farrago of media attention and posturing.
Not until the mid 1980s did the concept of environmental justice take hold. Today, there is real legal and regulatory substance to the concept. The disproportionate impacts of a range of environmentally problematic actions are run through an environmental justice screen, with public participation the cornerstone of this regime.
A similar but even broader framework needs to be developed for the concept of energy justice. Take coal development as a prime example of the poverty that characterizes the decision-making about the uses and abuses of this country’s energy resources. The often repeated line is that this nation has sufficient coal resources to sustain (a poor word) electricity production through the next century. “Energy independence” it is often called. Consequently, proposals are being floated to subsidize coal mining, build coal liquefaction plants (coal to gas) and ease environmental restrictions on mining and production.
There is very little mention of the human and environmental consequences of such ideas. There is sparse effort, for example, to calculate the true costs of such a head-long plunge into greater coal development. Who is calculating the costs of slides, torn-up roads and polluted water supplies on citizens and communities? Who is calculating the lost environmental services from lands destroyed by methods such as mountaintop removal mining? Who is calculating the loss of species from increased strip mining? Who is calculating the legacy depleting our coal resources leaves for future generations? No one, not in any coordinated sense.
Around the world and throughout history, areas rich in natural resources are persistently mired in poverty. Appalachia fits the bill. Who is creating scenarios to examine how this region could develop in just and sustainable ways? Except for a handful of rather obscure academic studies, the only genuine participatory efforts are coming from the grass roots of the region: ordinary citizens who value their mountains, their streams and their heritage. There is a religious movement that sees nature as inviolable, not a suitable realm for the perversities of the marketplace. They talk of justice, fairness and equity. They develop platforms for communities, the country and the world. Their voices have begun to infiltrate the debate over energy development. Why? Because they are right. Justice is on their side.