Epistemic justice as energy justice: reflections from a transnational collaboration on hydropower and Indigenous rights

Addressing the climate crisis requires renewable energy, however, developing renewable energy should be equitable. In this article, we analyze a 15-year-old transnational hydroelectric power development conflict involving Indigenous rights in Mapuche-Williche territory, Chile and a Norwegian state-owned company, Statkraft. We seek to advance the field of energy justice by evaluating injustices in this transnational conflict. At the heart of the conflict is a threatened Ngen Kintuantü (the spirit guardian Kintuantü), which is part of a ceremonial and pilgrimage site of utmost importance in Williche territory. We argue that epistemic justice – the radical inclusion of different ways of knowing – can be a central tenet to understanding and redressing the harms connected to energy development, especially via networks of solidarity with Indigenous rights claims. Yet currently, the right to consent for energy projects, – which is informed by the international legal mechanism Free, Prior, and Informed Consent and Chile's codification of a less stringent Indigenous consultation – is limited by its formation within liberal legality. Despite these limitations, the Traditional Organization of the Ayllarewe of Ngen Mapu Kintuantü, an organization of Mapuche-Williche communities, is crafting and demanding their own form of territorial consultation. Drawing from a solidarity network of research across the Global South and North, we find that existing tools like FPIC can and must be strengthened through Indigenous and local guidance, but that justice, in a broader sense, cannot be achieved without returning land and broader legal reforms.