A radical transformation of energy systems is currently underway as we shift to cleaner, renewable sources of energy generation and more targeted electricity demand management. Community actors and social enterprise structures are increasingly playing an important role in this change process. Community owned renewable energy (CORE) projects are opening up energy generation, distribution and sale as a site for ethical, community-based1 decision-making (Mulugetta et al. 2010; Cameron and Hicks 2013). In creating renewable energy social enterprises, community groups navigate the process of balancing and enacting layers of – ans at times conflicting - motivations. These motivations vary both within and between projects from action on climate change and energy security to regional development to community education and empowerment, reflecting the diverse motivations and contexts of the projects (Seyfang et al. 2013; Walker 2008; Warren and McFayden 2010). Importantly, as identified by Walker and Devine-Wright (2007), a fundamental and distinguishing feature of CORE is the attention played to both the processes and outcomes of projects. The process element draws attention to central governance questions such as: who is involved? Who has decision-making power? (Walker and Devine-Wright 2007).
In undertaking this research we sought to understand how communities navigate between motivations, theory and the practical realities of implementing CORE. To explore this question, we use action research methods and draw on the interplay between theory and practice – both that of the groups interviewed and our own experience as researcher-practitioners. Informed by a study of 26 CORE projects across the UK, Europe, North America and Australia between 2010-2014, this paper traces project motivations and ethical commitments through decisions community groups make around five key aspects of a CORE social enterprise: who the actors are, the distribution of decision-making power, the distribution of surplus, the scale of technology and the nature of community engagement. Data was collected through interviews with project leaders, site visits and project materials. Between one and five interviews were conducted with each project. Data was then analysed using qualitative thematic coding and key word searches.
This research indicates that decisions are influenced by both group motivations and external context but are made in more and less conscious ways, with groups being more and less aware of the options for and implications of certain decisions. A series of spectrums has been developed to demonstrate the range of choices available around these 5 key aspects of CORE projects introduced above. These spectrums have emerged through 3 cycles of action research within which the authors developed concepts, tested them in the field and further refined them as result of feedback from CORE practitioners.
The spectrums are presented as conceptual tools for helping academics, practitioners and policy makers unpack the complex nature of CORE and its development process and the implications these have on project governance and outcomes. In particular, we analyse the influence of motivations and ethical commitments on economic arrangements and the distribution of surplus by drawing on the community economies literature pioneered by J.K. Gibson Graham (2006) and J.K. Gibson Graham et al. (2013). Through different transactions, labour arrangements, enterprise structures and surplus decisions, CORE projects demonstrate the potential of conceptualising ‘the economy’ as a tool and approaching economic practice with creativity and inquisitiveness. With such an approach, groups are able to devise innovative economic solutions that fit with their material and ethical goals and within the constraints of their context.
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J_Hicks___N_Ison_Article_EMES_Conference_Helsinki_2015.pdf 