In Western democracies, non-institutional participation (NIP) is on the rise. NIP in the energy transition often creates spaces to incubate alternative ideas and novel forms of political participation (niches). Empowering these forms of political participation to encourage niche innovations can provoke the radical yet necessary changes required in the socio-technical system for a sustainable energy transition.

In Europe, NIP manifests in various forms, including involvement, civic engagement, formal political participation, and activism, each presenting distinct dynamics and challenges. The context and stakeholder analysis approach offer a framework to understand how NIP, such as a socio-technical system of collective action initiatives (CAIs), is driving and influencing the sustainable energy transition at the local level.

The principal goal of this paper is to present first results of two case studies of CAIs within NIP in the province of Granada, Spain. We analyse information and data to better understand the temporal, social, and spatial conditions in which CAIs emerge and evolve. This analysis forms part of a broader research effort in the framework of the project CO-SUSTAIN (HORIZON-CL2-2023-DEMOCRACY-01-05, Nº191132467). To better understand political participation linked to environmental, political and social imperatives, CO-SUSTAIN studies 18 historical examples in 6 different European countries for each of the latent and overt forms of political participation highlighted by Ekman: involvement, civic engagement, formal political participation and activism.

The first case is the Monachil Energy Community, a pioneering initiative in Spain that has served as a pilot example and reference for other local and regional initiatives. The second case is a movement of residents of the Northern District of Granada, with a primary target of establishing reliable energy access for them, particularly in marginalized neighborhoods, eliminating power cuts, improving the energy infrastructure, and pushing for inclusive energy policies. Our purpose is to compare the dynamics of participation in two cases, the drivers and barriers for political participation around climate imperatives in Spain, basing on Multi Level Perspective and institutional ethnography.

Although nuclear power is regaining interest as part of the energy transition and its objective of carbon neutrality, the fact remains that current infrastructures have a limited lifespan, generally between 30 and 40 years. Even if the question of extending the lifespan of selected nuclear power plants is currently being considered, hundreds of nuclear power plants will reach operational end in the coming decades. However, the literature on the future of these sites, with particular reference to their territorial inscription, is still in its early stages. Indeed, the nuclear industry marks its territory in different ways and over long periods of time. Hence, the intensity of debates, dismantling processes and proposed redevelopment projects vary considerably from one place to another.

This research therefore aims at examining the territorial dynamics of post-nuclear redevelopment through a comparative analysis of four European cases: Brunsbüttel (Germany), Fessenheim (France), Santa María de Garoña (Spain) and Wylfa (Wales).

The study addresses the following main research questions: What are the spatial, political, economic and socio-cultural factors influencing the redevelopment trajectories of post-nuclear regions?

Using a qualitative methodology, this research analyzes four nuclear power plants in different European countries, each representing distinct territorial contexts and decommissioning timeframes, as well as regulatory frameworks. The methodology includes:

• Semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders
• Document analysis of territorial development strategies and policies
• Press analysis

Preliminary findings from the first three cases highlight the importance of several key factors in successful territorial redevelopment:

• Pre-existing territorial resources and economic diversity
• National policy frameworks and multilevel support
• Local capacity to mobilize endogenous resources
• Time management

The research contributes to theoretical debates on territorial resilience and energy transition by demonstrating how local contexts shape redevelopment trajectories. It also provides practical insights for territories facing similar challenges. The findings have significant implications for European energy transition policies, suggesting the need for better integration between decommissioning strategies and territorial development planning. They also emphasize the importance of supporting local stakeholder capacity as well as cross-scale coordination in managing successful territorial redevelopment.

The term "energy transition" is often oversimplified in public discourse, reduced to a focus on emissions-free energy targets while black-boxing the intricate global supply chains and material flows that sustain them (Nadaï and Wallenborn, 2019). Rather than a uniform shift, energy transitions involve reconfigurations of socio-technical systems that reshape landscapes, infrastructures, and daily practices across geographies (Rotmans et al., 2001; Gailing and Moss, 2016; Buell, 2017). This abstraction risks misrepresenting the uneven spatial manifestations of transitions, where some regions advance while others remain burdened by legacy systems (Fuenfschilling and Binz, 2018).

Understanding the complexity of energy transitions requires analytical tools that reveal how global supply chains unfold in local contexts, materialising as production facilities, infrastructure, and worker settlements, all embedded in specific environmental conditions. Current approaches lack the tools to trace and represent material flows across scales while simultaneously capturing their socio-spatial configurations and territorial transformations. To address this gap, this study proposes a cross-scale mapping methodology that traces how uranium, as a material agent, shapes networks of production, infrastructure, and settlement patterns across interconnected sites. This approach situates energy transitions within multi-scalar networks, linking chemical processes to physical landscapes and technological artefacts to urban agglomerations.

Taking a neo-materialist perspective – emphasising how material properties and flows shape socio-spatial configurations (Knowles, 2014; Hecht, 2014; Tsing, 2021) – the study reveals that uranium’s territorial and social impacts challenge conventional notions of “green” energy. The methodology combines GIS-based territorial analysis with drawings, process diagrams, and verbal descriptions to visualise the spatiality of these socio-material assemblages from extraction to disposal. Through this, the approach integrates multiple scales, tracing uranium’s molecular impact to the socio-technical systems and large-scale territorial patterns it generates. By mapping material flows across interconnected sites, it visualises how uranium’s role in energy transitions co-produces dwelling, spilling, and hiding places, while highlighting historical path dependencies and inequalities often overlooked in sustainability frameworks.

The analysis begins in Arlit, Niger, where coal-powered uranium mining imposes severe socio-environmental costs on nearby settlements, underscoring the energy justice inequalities as local communities bear the burden of distant energy demands (Jenkins et al., 2016; McCauley et al., 2013; Sovacool et al., 2017). It then traces uranium’s commodification and enrichment in France, where nuclear energy is framed as "green" under the EU’s Green Taxonomy. Finally, the study examines Philippsburg, Germany, where interim nuclear storage facilities highlight the ongoing elephant in the room: what to do with nuclear waste?

The presentation explores challenges concerning energy transition in a specific socio-spatial setting: marginalised rural communities in Hungary. Based on 55 semi-structured interviews conducted in disadvantaged rural areas, applying the theoretical framework of energy justice it presents how the spatial-social inequalities in energy use generate energy injustice affecting marginalised rural households.

Energy poverty appears in many forms in such areas, and affects almost all households. However, the most commonly used indicators of energy poverty are not, or only to a limited extent, able to grasp many of the energy poverty situations in marginalised rural communities. Energy use, related problems, knowledge, skills, attitudes, household strategies for energy transition and energy crisis are embedded in the complex social and economic problems of households living in extreme poverty in the study areas, and cannot be considered separately from such a problem complex. The severe housing and infrastructure problems are not limited to issues related to energy use, they often pose a direct life threat to household members. Within such a context, interventions concerning energy transition can only be considered in a way that addresses housing and infrastructure problems in a complex way. The amount of material resources devoted to energy use and their allocation strategy is determined by the resource-poor and subsistence-focused strategy of the households concerned. Yet, it is not relevant to describe the energy use of these households only in terms of knowledge and skills gaps: knowledge and practices on consumption reduction, for example, are part of the daily routine of many households in extreme poverty. While the consumption reduction practices of households in extreme poverty may indeed have an emission reduction effect, the question is whether it is morally acceptable to consider this the sustainability practice of households in extreme poverty? This raises questions concerning how to define energy consumption that is socially necessitated (Bouzarovski 2014), sufficient (Kiss (2023)) or provides an acceptable standard of living ('social basis') (Raworth 2022).