Energy Geographies Research Group ‘Activism Award’
The Award
This award aims to distinguish individuals or organisations who make a significant contribution to energy justice through public engagement, scholarship, teaching, direct action, or other means. By ‘energy justice’ we mean a commitment to social justice or the empowerment of vulnerable communities and marginalized groups as part of low-carbon transitions.
Anyone can apply for the award, provided that their work directly or indirectly draws upon or contributes to energy geographies research. You don’t have to be an academic (established or early career) to apply for the prize.
The award can also be given as a joint prize - for example, for researchers and communities working together - or researchers might choose to nominate communities they’ve worked with whose work deserves recognition.
Examples of contributions include (but are not limited to): active engagement with low-carbon energy transitions within a local community; educational activities outside academia that foster inclusive understandings of energy justice; a conceptual/theoretical contribution to the academic field of energy geographies; or a substantive contribution to climate change policymaking.
The Prize
The winner will receive a cash prize of £75. To receive the cash prize, the winner must nominate a bank account that accepts UK bank transfers.
In addition, the winner will be invited to the Royal Geographical Society annual conference in London (1 - 4 September) to showcase their work. If the winner is outside of academia or does not have access to conference attendance funds, the Energy Geographies (EnGRG) will cover their attendance costs through our sponsorship route.
Energy Geographies Research Group will also work with the winner to promote their work through a webinar, blog or video interview which will be promoted across and beyond the RGS-IBG network.
Who can apply?
Individuals or organisations based in the UK.
Their contribution took place within or outside the UK.
Their contribution took place within one year of the application deadline.
We accept self-nominations or nominations by a third-party.
Submission deadline: 5pm GMT, Thursday, 7 May 2026.
Application:
Submissions must be in the English language. Please submit the nomination by the due date in one of the following formats:
(1) A Nomination Letter of no more than 500 words;
OR
(2) A Nomination Video of no more than 5 minutes.
The Nomination should explain the following:
A short bio of the nominee;
The contribution made to energy justice for which they are being nominated for;
Evidence of the social justice impact they achieved.
Please send submissions or questions about your application to Pancho Lewis (francisco.t.lewis@durham.ac.uk)
Judging and evaluation criteria:
Submissions will be assessed by a panel of judges drawn from the membership of the Energy Geographies Research Group Committee. The application will be evaluated for:
Evidence of Impact on energy justice, especially considering the career stage and/or the resources available to the applicant;
Originality of the approach to energy justice;
Clarity of structure and execution of Nomination Letter or Nomination Video.
2026 Winner
Activism Award 2026 Winner
Professor Peter Newell, School of Global Studies, University of Sussex, UK
Peter Newell is Professor of International Relations at the University of Sussex and theme lead for sustainability at the Sussex School for Progressive Futures. For over 30 years he has worked in different ways on the question of how to move the world beyond fossil fuels: as an activist working with groups such as Climate Network Europe, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, Extinction Rebellion and as an academic working on issues of climate politics and climate justice and questions of just energy transitions.
These worlds have increasingly come together around a proposal he developed in 2018 with his colleague Andrew Simms for a fossil fuel non-proliferation treaty which has generated a great deal of impact. First proposed in an opinion piece in The Guardian, the idea quickly garnered the support of key figures such as Naomi Klein, Bill McKibben and the heads of major environmental organisations. The idea is now the centre of a global campaign which enjoys the support of 18 governments, international institutions such as the WHO and European Parliament and hundreds of indigenous, human rights, labour, women’s, faith-based and environmental organisations as well as cities and businesses and over a million individuals. The former Irish President Mary Robinson even took it to the UN Security Council. At the Santa Marta conference on a fair phase out from fossil fuels, hosted by the governments of Colombia and the Netherlands in April 2026, momentum grew to begin negotiations towards a treaty.
Having first proposed the idea, Prof. Newell continues to sit on the steering committee of the treaty campaign, participate in the legal working group of the treaty which presented proposals on possible elements of the treaty to supporting governments in Santa Marta and has published a series of foundational articles laying out the form a treaty could take including its elements and pathways to a treaty. This is in addition to making the case for the treaty in national, regional and international fora from the EU to the Council for Foreign Relations.
Energy justice is at the heart of the treaty’s work – seeking to secure both a global phase out led by those countries with the greatest responsibility to act and the greatest capacity to diversify their economies and support through a global transition fund to poorer countries with diversifying their own economies and to address issues of debt and fiscal crisis which they currently face. Research underpinning this through the just transitions learning project has worked with civil society organisations on the frontlines of energy transitions in Colombia, Mozambique and Nigeria and been advanced through policy dialogues on these issues with the governments on Azerbaijan, Ghana, Brazil, Nigeria and Trinidad and Tobago. This work has helped to document and amplify the voices of those suffering the gravest forms of energy (in)justice.
The Energy Geographies Research Group believes this work makes an important contribution to climate change policymaking and to centring questions of energy justice in debates about how to transition away from fossil fuels in the energy system.