Kirsten Jenkins

The Political Economy of Energy Justice: A Nuclear Energy Perspective

Energy justice has recently emerged as a new crosscutting social science research agenda. In this chapter, its core tenets are explored: distributional justice, procedural justice, and justice as recognition. Using a case study approach of nuclear waste in Canada, nuclear reactors in the UK, and uranium mines in Australia, the manifestations of energy justice in practice are illustrated from a political economy perspective through analysing the nuclear energy sector. This focus allows us to identify both winners and losers with regard to energy justice throughout the nuclear energy system. Through promoting the application of this triple-pronged approach across the energy system and within the global context of energy production and consumption, recommendations for its operationalisation are advanced. Of significance, the political economy focus highlights the key areas for conflicts and trade-offs amongst the core tenets of energy justice as the concept makes policy ground.