Public Participation and People-led Policy
For climate policy on a local and national level to be effective, it has to be based on public participation and take into account the needs and voices of communities.
We therefore make the following recommendations to be included in the Kerry County Council Development Plan (if not included already):
- Outside the development of this plan, the council should lead annual local climate dialogues which serve to inform communities about the ongoing transition to a low carbon society and seek their opinions, ideas and consent.
- The Climate Action and Environment office, or equivalent, within the council must be adequately resourced, publicised and staffed. These offices should work closely with local communities to improve education and access to information around environmental issues, proactively engage in consultations and participatory processes which allow local people to have a say in the energy transition in their area.
- Wherever practically possible, participatory processes should be designed in a participatory way, with input from representatives of all groups who are expected to take part.
- Special outreach efforts must be made to include disadvantaged or marginalised groups in participatory processes. Those running participatory processes should keep a detailed record of the participation of marginalised groups and of best practices that serve to increase this participation.
- Support and establish community energy projects throughout the lifetime of the county development plan.
Throughout the lifetime of this county development plan, Ireland’s transition to a low carbon society is entering its most crucial decade. It's vital that it should be centred around providing people and communities with clean, affordable and reliable energy. The best way to do so is to ensure citizen participation at all levels and stages of the energy transition.
There are many different ways in which people can participate in governance, ranging from informing to consultation to partnership to citizen control, whereby community members control the process (Armstein, 1969) {xxiv}. While all of these methods of participation are useful and valid at different stages of policymaking, different forms of participation should be incorporated into major decisions (such as energy infrastructure projects) to create a thoroughly participative process; for example, informing and consulting at the stage of technical impact assessments. Ideally, there should be citizen participation in the design of the participatory process itself, for example through focus groups or workshops which feed directly into sub-national and national policymaking.
Community participation and ownership has proved important for public acceptance of the energy transition in countries where the transition is more advanced than in Ireland. For example, in Germany, 70% of the tax paid by wind turbine operators goes directly to the municipality where the turbines are based. In Denmark, taxes on energy go into funds to subsidise local initiatives for environmental improvement and community generation. Denmark also requires that local communities have a 20% share in onshore or near-shore wind turbines. Ownership measures like this are shown to increase community acceptance of energy transition infrastructure, and can take the form of individual shares in an energy project, community ownership of part of the infrastructure, or joint ventures between communities and developers {xxv}. There are many renewable energy projects that, with the support of the Council, can be developed. Numerous renewable energy exemplar projects exist around Europe, such as the Edinburgh Community Solar Co-operative, which empowers the public to be part of the transition to a low carbon society {xxvi}.
References
Arnstein, S. R. (1969). A ladder of citizen participation. Journal of the American Institute of planners, 35(4), 216-224. {xxiv}
Olsen, E. (2016). Renewable energy: public acceptance and citizens’ financial participation. Elgar Encyclopaedia of Environmental Law. Available at: https://www.elgaronline.com/view/nlm-book/9781786436986/b-9781783477616-I_39.xml {xxv}
Edinburgh Community Solar Co-operative. (2021). About Us | Edinburgh Community Solar Co-operative. https://www.edinburghsolar.coop/about-us/ {xxvi}