TY - JOUR

T1 - Conceptualizing community in energy systems

T2 - A systematic review of 183 definitions

AU - Bauwens, Thomas

AU - Schraven, Daan

AU - Drewing, Emily

AU - Radtke, Jörg

AU - Holstenkamp, Lars

AU - Gotchev, Boris

AU - Yildiz, Özgür

PY - 2022/3/1

Y1 - 2022/3/1

N2 - Community-based energy systems are gaining traction among policymakers and practitioners as promising models for implementing a low-carbon energy transition. As a result, there has been a proliferation of concepts in the scientific literature, such as community energy, energy communities, community solar, and community wind. However, what scholars mean by “community” in these contexts is often unclear and inconsistent. This paper provides further conceptual clarity in the field by analyzing how the term of community is conceptualized in the scholarly literature on energy systems, through a systematic review of 405 articles. We combine an author keyword network analysis of this corpus with an in-depth analysis of 183 definitions extracted from these articles and systematically coded across three dimensions: meanings, activities and objectives of communities. Our findings show that the meanings attached to the notion of community and the alleged objectives pursued by communities vary substantially across concepts and over time. In particular, there has been a shift away from a notion of community understood as a process that emphasizes participatory aspects toward a notion of community primarily referring to a place. Furthermore, there is a growing focus on communities' economic objectives rather than their social or political goals. These findings suggest a weakening of scholars’ attention to “transformative” notions of community emphasizing collective and grassroots processes of participation in energy transitions, to the benefit of “instrumental” notions. This trend runs the risk of placing the sole emphasis on the market value of communities, thereby diluting their distinctiveness from more commercial actors.

AB - Community-based energy systems are gaining traction among policymakers and practitioners as promising models for implementing a low-carbon energy transition. As a result, there has been a proliferation of concepts in the scientific literature, such as community energy, energy communities, community solar, and community wind. However, what scholars mean by “community” in these contexts is often unclear and inconsistent. This paper provides further conceptual clarity in the field by analyzing how the term of community is conceptualized in the scholarly literature on energy systems, through a systematic review of 405 articles. We combine an author keyword network analysis of this corpus with an in-depth analysis of 183 definitions extracted from these articles and systematically coded across three dimensions: meanings, activities and objectives of communities. Our findings show that the meanings attached to the notion of community and the alleged objectives pursued by communities vary substantially across concepts and over time. In particular, there has been a shift away from a notion of community understood as a process that emphasizes participatory aspects toward a notion of community primarily referring to a place. Furthermore, there is a growing focus on communities' economic objectives rather than their social or political goals. These findings suggest a weakening of scholars’ attention to “transformative” notions of community emphasizing collective and grassroots processes of participation in energy transitions, to the benefit of “instrumental” notions. This trend runs the risk of placing the sole emphasis on the market value of communities, thereby diluting their distinctiveness from more commercial actors.

KW - Community renewable energy

KW - Decentralized energy resources

KW - Local energy systems

KW - Low-carbon transition

KW - Peer-to-peer energy market

KW - Prosumers

KW - Sustainability Governance

KW - Environmental Governance

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85121314157&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1016/j.rser.2021.111999

DO - 10.1016/j.rser.2021.111999

M3 - Journal articles

AN - SCOPUS:85121314157

VL - 156

JO - Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews

JF - Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews

SN - 1364-0321

M1 - 111999

ER -