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Paper short abstract:

Fuel Stories is a participatory action research method that uses visual elicitation as a mode of public consultation. This paper discusses project findings and uncovers mechanisms by which muted groups’ voices can be heard in the policy landscape, in order to shape better development outcomes.

Paper long abstract:

Fuel Stories is a participatory action research method that uses visual elicitation as a mode of public consultation. Funded by the Bristol Sustainable Energy Research Fund, Fuel Stories has addressed a recognised gap in community development work both in UK and internationally. This paper discusses project findings based on oral histories gathered through the Fuel Stories Method.

The Fuel Stories project is underpinned by the theoretical notion of infrastructural inequalities. Inequalities related to uneven access to infrastructures cut across the more typically studied and understood structural inequalities, and as such are a novel way to understand why and how new technologies are taken up, and by whom. In the context of a socially just energy transition, accounting for infrastructural inequalities will provide important evidence for improved operations and policy-making.

Fuel Stories thus uncovers mechanisms by which muted groups’ voices can be heard in the policy landscape, in order to shape better development outcomes. This paper argues that this kind of applied research work is not only an essential part of delivering a more just energy transition, but argues for more participatory action research, which can feed into regulatory mechanisms that aim to embed competing economic, social and environmental value into planning and infrastructural development, and responsible public spending.