Energy, Space and Inequalities: Exploring Pathways toward a Just Energy Transition

This paper critically examines the landscape implications of a large-scale photovoltaic (PV) project (60 MW) proposed in the area of Aspri Petra, within the rural region of Xino Nero (Amyndeo) in Western Macedonia, Greece. Drawing on the conceptual framework of landscape as a socio-ecological and experiential system, the study moves beyond conventional Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) approaches that treat landscape primarily as a visual or aesthetic parameter. Instead, it adopts an integrative perspective that considers the structural, functional, symbolic, and experiential dimensions of landscape, in line with the European Landscape Convention. The analysis is based on a systematic review of the EIA study, combined with spatial interpretation and critical evaluation of its methodological assumptions. Particular emphasis is placed on identifying conceptual and methodological gaps in the treatment of landscape, including the absence of cumulative impact assessment, limited spatial scope, insufficient consideration of geomorphological, biogeographical and hydrological transformations, and the neglect of local socio-cultural and productive systems. The findings indicate that the project constitutes a profound spatial intervention that reconfigures the landscape from a multifunctional rural system into a predominantly energy-oriented space. Extensive land coverage, terrain modifications, and associated infrastructural networks introduce lasting transformations in geomorphology, microclimate, ecological processes, and land-use patterns. Furthermore, the project appears misaligned with the strategic directions of the Regional Spatial Planning Framework, which prioritizes agricultural specialization, landscape-based development, and the promotion of quality local products, particularly wine and special interest tourism. The study also highlights limited public participation/consultation and the absence of locally grounded benefit-sharing mechanisms, raising critical questions regarding decision-making processes and the distribution of impacts. Overall, the paper argues that large-scale renewable energy projects, when insufficiently embedded in landscape-sensitive planning frameworks, risk undermining the socio-spatial coherence and long-term development trajectories of rural regions, while its findings may inform more equitable and participatory planning approaches.

This paper examines the EU's twin digital and green transitions (TTs) through the lens of peripheral political economies, focusing on the electricity sectors in coal regions of Western Macedonia (Greece) and Stara Zagora (Bulgaria). Τhe paper conceptualises TTs as contested processes that reorganise governance, capital allocation, and labour markets, producing deeply unequal geographies of transition. Drawing on Europeanisation and world-ecology perspectives, the TTs function as a form of crisis governance that attempts to stabilise existing political–economic structures while reconfiguring their spatial and institutional expressions, with significant consequences for territorial cohesion and social justice. Methodologically, the paper employs a mixed research design, combining primary research through interviews with workers, local stakeholders, and energy experts conducted between June and October 2025, with secondary data analysis. Empirically, the analysis shows that Greece's accelerated renewable deployment, coupled with growing dependence on imported gas, large-scale infrastructure investment, and the retreat of vertically integrated public utilities, and Bulgaria's delayed transition, shaped by coal dependence and regulatory inertia, represent different temporalities of the same structural logic. In both cases, decarbonisation advances alongside intensified financialisation of energy systems, weakened public service provision, and the emergence of new forms of energy vulnerability and socio-spatial dependency. These dynamics are acutely felt at the regional and community scale, where coal phase-out reshapes not only employment but access to affordable energy, local fiscal capacity, and the basic conditions of social reproduction. At the same time, early labour market outcomes reveal a shift from territorially embedded, unionised employment toward more fragmented and precarious forms of work, mediated by often inadequate reskilling policies. The paper concludes that the TTs operate as a hegemonic project, mobilising narratives of modernisation and resilience that legitimise infrastructural expansion and market restructuring without challenging extractivist political economies or addressing the unequal distribution of transition costs.

Mountainous areas are recognized as important sources of renewable energy, particularly for wind energy and hydropower. However, the rapid deployment of renewable energy projects in these areas raises critical questions regarding spatial justice, environmental protection and the uneven distribution of costs and benefits. In Greece, mountainous areas are increasingly characterized by a high concentration of renewable energy installations, often in landscapes of high ecological value, biodiversity richness and cultural significance. This growing pressure has also triggered a proliferation of local social movements opposing the siting of such energy projects. This paper investigates the geographic distribution of renewable energy projects in Greece, aiming to identify and quantify emerging territorial inequalities. Based on official data from the Regulatory Authority for Waste, Energy and Water (RAAEY), we compile a comprehensive geospatial dataset regarding energy projects with the occurring data being aggregated at the level of municipalities and municipal units. A set of spatial indicators is further developed, including installed capacity density (MW/km²), capacity per capita (MW/inhabitant), and estimated annual energy production density (MWh/km²). Using GIS-based spatial analyses, the geographic distribution of renewable energy infrastructure is visualized, while patterns of concentration and clustering across the Greek territory are identified and quantified. The results are expected to reveal significant spatial inequalities, with a disproportionate concentration of projects in mountainous and sparsely populated areas. These findings highlight the emergence of a form of “territorial burden” associated with the energy transition, raising important questions about the fairness and social acceptance of current deployment strategies. By foregrounding the geographical dimensions of renewable energy development, this study contributes to ongoing debates on just energy transitions, emphasizing the need for more balanced, participatory and territorially sensitive energy planning.

This paper examines Crete as an emerging energy infrastructure corridor in the Eastern Mediterranean. Official narratives in the country frame energy transition as decarbonisation and green development and a response to climate crisis. Within this context, Crete is increasingly presented as a future energy hub in the Eastern Mediterranean, where interconnections, renewable-energy investments and infrastructural upgrading promise growth and progress. On the island, however, this promise condenses into a dense and contested infrastructural geography. Drawing on a critical mapping exercise, the paper traces how this transition narrative materialises across Crete’s infrastructural landscape. It maps planned and existing energy infrastructures on and around the island — wind and solar parks, high-voltage lines, substations, interconnections, data centres and offshore energy projects — in order to examine the material geography behind the promise of green development. It then places these infrastructures in relation to collective mobilisations and grassroots initiatives contesting renewable energy and other large-scale investment projects, showing how the island’s infrastructural future has become a terrain of conflict. Finally, by bringing energy projects into relation with tourist and refugee routes, and with the geopolitical context of war and militarisation in the Eastern Mediterranean, the paper asks how Crete is being produced as a Mediterranean corridor: through unequal circulations of energy, capital and people, and through struggles over land, water, development and everyday life in the island. Maps are thus used not as neutral illustrations, but as a critical method for making visible the unequal power relations and situated knowledges obscured by official transition narratives.

Energy poverty is most often discussed in terms of household income, energy prices, housing conditions, and access to basic energy services. However, this issue is not limited to the realm of consumption; it is also closely linked to the spatial organization of energy systems, infrastructure investments, regional inequalities, and governance processes. This paper aims to discuss the relationship between energy poverty and a just energy transition in energy-producing regions, using the Upper Tigris Basin as a case study. The study’s central premise is that regions hosting energy production infrastructure may not always be in a advantageous position regarding energy access, local benefits, and socio-economic development. In this context, hydroelectric infrastructure is considered not merely as electricity generation systems but as spatial processes that reshape relationships involving water resources, local communities, environmental change, and regional development. The paper is structured as an exploratory case study. Through official energy and socio-economic indicators, the spatial distribution of renewable energy infrastructure, and field observations, the following question will be examined: Why and how might a region contributing to energy production experience energy vulnerability, limited local benefits, and exclusion from decision-making processes? Within this framework, the study argues that a just energy transition cannot be evaluated solely through the expansion of renewable energy capacity or the reduction of carbon emissions. If dimensions of distributive justice, participation, recognition, and spatial inequality are not taken into account, renewable energy infrastructure may reproduce existing regional inequalities rather than reduce them. The Upper Tigris Basin example demonstrates that energy poverty must be addressed not only at the household level but also within the contexts of infrastructure, water governance, climate variability, and regional development.

The increasing frequency and severity of heatwaves are radically transforming the way people live in major urban centres. Whilst public spaces are at the heart of urban heat adaptation policies, little is known about how people cope with extreme heat in their homes on a day-to-day basis. Drawing on oral history methodologies, and in particular on an in-progress campaign of nearly 50 biographical interviews with people aged between 55 and 90, our research examines how people’s ways of coping with the heat have evolved in the Athens metropolitan area from the 1970s to the present day. This empirical data allows us to describe the gradual reconfigurations of urban thermalscapes in Athens – understood as environmental, material, discursive and cultural constructions, which determines how people perceive and adapt to heat – and to highlight their impact on urban modes of living. The proposition relies on a multiscalar analysis. First, we examine the evolution of bodily experiences of heat over that time period. Then, we consider the domestic experiences of heat and the links between ways of living and cooling down. Finally, we investigate changes at the urban scale, in terms of public space use and energy consumption. More broadly, our analysis invites to understand coolness as the result of a constant negotiation between individuals and their environments, in which energy-intensive technologies are playing an increasingly prominent role. This analysis leads us to argue for the importance of structuring the field of critical heat studies, situated at the intersection of urban climatology, urban studies and energy studies.

The transition towards climate- neutral neighborhood in urban environment brought on the spotlight energy efficiency and larger scale interventions. However, most approaches are exclusively technical, prioritizing building performance while overlooking sociospatial inequalities that energy transition policies usually create. In Mediterranean cities, where mixed land uses, compact urban form and vertical social segregation prevail, energy performance is unevenly distributed and closely linked to urban morphology and everyday practices. This paper proposes a methodological framework that combines cadastral data analysis, statistical reconstruction, typological classification and microclimatic simulation to investigate the spatial distribution of environmental conditions at neighborhood scale. Using Exarcheia, a central area in Athens, as a case study, the research reconstructs missing building data and develops a detailed urban dataset to support the analysis on thermal comfort, airflow and environmental stress. Building upon these results, the study advances a sociospatial analysis of urban dynamics, examining how environmental performance intersects with patterns of use, housing conditions and social intensity. Preliminary findings suggests that areas of increased thermal stress coincide with highly mixed-use areas, revealing a complex interaction between environmental conditions and everyday life. The paper, as a first step of ongoing research, argues that energy efficiency and neighborhood scale interventions cannot be expressed exclusively as technical solutions, as their implementation often fails to address the uneven capacity of different social groups to access and benefit from them, while also overlooking specific spatial, social and housing conditions that shape local need and constraints. As a last step, the research introduces a participatory design approach as an open dialogue with the community of the neighborhood in order to connect environmental analysis with local knowledge to support the development of adaptive and socially inclusive strategies. By integrating morphology, microclimate and sociospatial dynamics, the study contributes to the critical discussion on energy justice and urban transitions.

Our biggest challenge in dealing with decaying urban regions regarding social justice and climate change is the "existing". Targeted planning policy for energy efficiency upgrades of neighbourhoods is key to achieving notable, lasting results. To unlock designated funding, these must combine with the rehabilitation of their environment. In Greece and abroad, attempted interventions in lagging residential areas with socio-spatial disparities address various "R-URBAN" tasks: rehabilitate, reactivate, regenerate, reduce, restructure, refill, recycle, reuse, rethink, etc. However, the nexus of "climate-change/energy/poverty" remains outside mainstream urban planning policy and practice, whereas the energy dimension, constrained by diverse barriers, is not sufficiently embedded in relative doctrines. In Athenian neighbourhoods with concentrations of vulnerable social groups, urban heat, degrading buildings, shabby environments and diverse poverties feed each other, framing realities within which people interact. Lacking social housing and energy retrofit projects at "scale of impact", people remain exposed to inequalities, as housing precarity and socio-spatial dynamics intensify. The scale of impact is dependent on planning policy. Planning policy for EP must address regions of different intensities/characteristics (especially in terms of cost/benefit). In crafting policy, one must deal with institutional frameworks (of diverse largely segregated authorities), induce practice shifts by improving planning principles at different scales and building code regulations, and identify facilitating mechanisms for decision-making and types of actions for optimal cost/benefit ratio. Further, funding targeted interventions requires a planning policy to connect with policies of urban and regional development, considering differentiations among regions. Planning policies leading to more just energy futures need contributions from scientific fields such as environmental physics, urban economics, social sciences and urban geography, whereas targeted multi-criteria spatial mapping and energy assessments valued by empirical wisdom is necessary. A case study of a typical central Athenian neighbourhood may be presented at the Conference.

The presentation summarises the findings and insights gathered from 790 household visits conducted in the Athens Urban Area, in the context of REVERTER, an EU LIFE-funded project aiming to alleviate energy poverty through the deep renovation of dwellings occupied by vulnerable households. The visits, which were organised by EKPIZO’s one-stop shop (OSS), served both as a data collection exercise and as a direct engagement tool, enabling the project team to assess vulnerable households’ conditions related to energy use, comfort, and vulnerability, as well as their awareness, attitudes, and willingness to participate in energy efficiency programmes. Based on the analysis of the questionnaire’s responses, more than 80% of homes in the assessed housing stock were energy inefficient, resulting in high energy demand and poor indoor comfort. About 50-60% of the households were struggling to make ends meet. Among these households, over 60% failed to meet basic thermal comfort standards, reported cuts in other essentials, such as food purchases and health-related spending and - compared to those living comfortably - damp/mould issues are up to 78% more prevalent and health problems related to energy conditions are up to 12.6 times more common. Despite the clear need, only 45% of households expressed willingness to participate in subsidised home energy renovation schemes. The primary denial reasons cited include financial constraints (46%), bureaucratic fears (23.2%), scepticism about energy savings (19.3%), lack of awareness (14.7%) and ownership issues (10.2%). Even among those willing to participate, 20.8% cannot afford to contribute anything, and 56.5% could not manage the hypothetical monthly repayment of the retrofit cost, regardless of income group. These findings underlined that financial inaccessibility cuts across all income groups, though its effects are most severe for the most vulnerable, and points to the need for integrated social and energy policy responses.

Energy communities (ECs) represent a transformative shift in energy systems, prioritising environmental, economic, and social benefits while fostering citizen participation. However, comprehensive frameworks for evaluating their multidimensional impacts remain limited, particularly in Southern European contexts where spatial inequalities and uneven regulatory landscapes shape their development. This perspective article addresses this gap by developing a 22-indicator framework capturing social, economic, environmental, and governance dimensions, and applying it to four Greek ECs across distinct spatial contexts — rural, urban, and island settings. Using a mixed-methods approach, we assessed mature ECs adhering to cooperative principles, explicitly accounting for how place-based conditions and territorial constraints mediate outcomes. Our findings reveal strong democratic innovation and social capital formation; however, these achievements remain constrained by project scale, regulatory barriers, and financing limitations that are themselves spatially uneven in their effects. This tension between democratic excellence and scaling constraints emerges consistently across all four dimensions. ECs performed strongest in governance dimensions while facing universal scaling challenges attributable to systemic policy barriers. The analysis demonstrates that democratic governance and economic efficiency can be complementary rather than competing objectives — a finding with implications for spatially just energy transitions. The framework shows potential applicability beyond Greece, though transferability depends on territorial regulatory context and organisational development stage. While ECs may not fully transform energy systems on their own, they constitute essential, place-sensitive building blocks of democratic, inclusive energy futures.