Dal greenwashing alle transizioni giuste: Colmare il divario tra le tradizionali conoscenze ecologiche (TEK) e le eco-innovazioni TECH nel progetto CSR di un'azienda di energia rinnovabile

Large energy companies have had the capacity to impact economies and the environment at large scales. Through their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) projects, they have attempted to simultaneously seek competitive edge, while addressing the pressure coming from the public and governments to transition to renewable energy and lessen carbon emissions through eco-innovation. However, eco-innovations such as those for renewable energy and carbon capture and storage (CCS) monitoring and evaluation systems (M&E systems), are not the only technologies needed. Discourse analysis techniques are needed to facilitate, monitor, and evaluate inclusivity - a key aspect of just transitions. The complexities of quantifying discourses have not been possible in the past and CSR eco-innovation projects, especially involving Indigenous communities with Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK), have therefore been vulnerable to the injustices of greenwashing. Injustices, such as the disregard for Indigenous methodologies and social practices that have historically lead to not only a loss in identity and culture, but also to poverty, forced migration, and even genocide; remain obscured and unmeasured when there is a lack of discourse on the topic. This paper serves two purposes: 1) to illuminate the discourse gaps between stakeholders in renewable energy company CSR projects by renewable energy companies amongst Indigenous communities using the methodology of digital discourse analysis and 2) experiment with digital discourse technology as a future tool to create a multilocus value map for identifying influencing factors that can be used as an M&E system for transformative just transitions in eco-innovation CSR projects. Fair representation between actors, sovereignty, and the environment as a primary stakeholder are key principles in the Indigenous Two-eyed approach. It is anticipated that this approach could, in the future, be helpful in developing a CSR project participatory value map as an M&E system for the integration of TEK with “Tech”, such as renewable energy technology, for eco-innovations. The indicator of just transitions success for such research intervention could be the degree of local participation in co-designing of network maps and the degree of discourse gaps in resulting policies, which could be measured at major iterations of policy drafts. This could: 1) help facilitate communications to encourage collaboration and mitigate conflict between stakeholders, 2) be used to regulate financing and/or penalties for greenwashing by distinguishing mandatory and voluntary requirements on a project-by-project basis, and 3) provide transparency to build trust and reinforce relationships between stakeholders for long-term inclusive and collaborative resource management, especially where Indigenous Peoples are located.