Energy communities are of interest to researchers because when lots of growth happens fast in a small community, predictable social effects take place due to the disruption the industrial development brings. Often, a few individuals carry a tremendous burden.

"Those effects are a whole set of disruptions to social function, social life. Some impacts to everyday quality of life and the way that that manifests for many people is that a small number of people are being asked to do a whole number of new activities or jobs that are in addition to what they were doing in everyday life - whether that is responding to requests from the media or going to more meetings or doing something as basic as extra activities in their church to respond to the needs that have developed in their community.

There is a surge of activity that happens that often occurs before local government or state government have set up the processes to help mitigate the impacts of that surge of activity..."

Julia Haggerty, Researcher

Why Study Energy-Impacted Communities?

Researcher Dr. Julia Haggerty explains why energy-impacted communities are so often areas of study for social scientists. (Video length: 2:53. Click the CC button within the video to read captioning)

 

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