A dream of Black communities empowered and in power of their electric mobility futures.
May 21, 2024 |. Black Sustainability, Inc. joins EV Noire, Southeast Alliance for Clean Energy and Clean Cities Georgia to support the Electric Black Futures initiative.
BACKGROUND
In October 2023, EVNoire, the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy (SACE) and Clean Cities Georgia, was awarded a $1.4 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Vehicle Technologies Office Program Wide Funding Opportunity titled Advancing Equitable Access to EVs, Infrastructure, and Jobs in Underserved Communities in Georgia.
BSI is serving as a Community Liaison identifying leaders in Alternative Energy and supporting Black communities in metro-Atlanta to envision and create their electric mobility future. Our organization also has the pleasure of working with Subsume Studios' Dreden Snead to actualize Afrofuturism tenants that ground our work on this project and Albany, GA's SOWEGA Rising.
This project has largely been spearheaded by EV Noire's dynamic team led by EVNoire Co-Founder and Managing Partner Dr. Shelley Francis, SACE’s Electric Transportation Equity Manager Madelyn Collins, SACE’s Electric Transportation Director Stan Cross, and Clean Cities Georgia Program Manager Sumner Pomeroy.
Launching in 2024 across Atlanta, Savannah, and Albany, Electric Black Futures is a transformative project spanning three years that aims to invigorate e-mobility leadership and job opportunities in Black communities. The electric transition is a people transition and having access to directly make decisions and participate in the building of that future is crucial for just innovation.
ALL THAT'S 'CLEAN' ISN'T GREEN NOR SEEN
All tech is not made OR sourced equally and has implicit, technical bias. Often, the rooms where advancement is crafted do not reflect the lived experiences or culture of the people that are expected to adopt it. Occupational segregation is a common pattern we end up seeing in tech where people of different classes, races, and genders are unevenly represented in different kinds of jobs.
Additionally, as the West continues development, exploitation of natural resources and communities of African descent continue. As we explore clean energy and equitable access, Black Sustainability is
To maintain this north star, Electric Black Futures instills Afrofuturism in its engagement with communities. Afrofuturism, a cultural, theoretical, and artistic movement, imagines the future through the lens of African and African diasporic experiences, envisioning a world where Black communities thrive amidst technological advancements and social progress. To create Afro-futures, we have to create, as Afrofuturist Stacey Robinson coined, the Afro-now.
Black communities will be encouraged to create transformative visions of e-mobility futures that transcend historical oppressions and exclusions. By combining this artistic activism with community-based data research, Electric Black Futures aims to articulate a culturally relevant vision of e-mobility that resonates deeply with Black communities and can be translated into practical strategies and tactics to autonomously manifest this future.
As Georgia emerges as a leader in transportation electrification, prioritizing community voices has the potential to shape a more just and sustainable future locally and nationally. Electric Black Futures’ dream is a future where Black communities are empowered and in power of their electric, just futures.
Electric Black Futures and Afrofuturism
Electric Black Futures (EBF) is a way to utilize a very intentional and forward-thinking Afrofuturism frame to create a culturally relevant futurescoping methodology centered around the lived experiences of Black people in technological innovation.
In 2021, it was found that 8 percent of clean energy workers were Black or African American. When broken down by energy sector, renewable fuels, energy efficiency, and clean vehicles all tied for the lowest at 6 percent. In general across the entire energy industry, Black or African American workers were underrepresented in nearly every category examined. The only sectors that achieved double-digit representation were gas and diesel vehicles (12 percent) and fossil fuel generation (10 percent).
The story is clear, despite the work our Black Sustainability team has done to map the Black and Green ecosystem and identify Black and Green experts and entities, Black communities are not at the forefront of leading energy transformation, especially when it comes to clean energy. To raise awareness of this disparity and forge pathways for communities of African descent to shape the landscape of ‘the e-mobility future’, SACE, EVNoire (EVN), and Clean Cities Georgia (CC-GA) are working in partnership with key educational institutions, city officials, grassroots organizers, and e-mobility implementation agencies to revolutionize the conceptualization, development, and implementation of innovating our transportation systems. By centering communities’ knowledge, vision, culture, and imagination, this project aims to put more Black hands at the helm of driving the direction and crafting the electric future.
Fellow Project Partners
Black Sustainability, Inc. joined this project to ensure that underserved Black communities and unsung community-based organizations across three Georgia cities – Albany, Atlanta, and Savannah – are actively engaged and empowered to create and deploy equitable, accessible electric mobility initiatives and gain access to the jobs that the transition to electric transportation is bringing to Georgia.
Goals over the next three years include:
Leveraging community-based participatory research and engagement to co-create community-centered electric mobility plans that connect Black communities to federal funding and clean energy jobs and address the disproportionate environmental and transportation burdens that impact Black communities’ social and economic well-being
Empowering future-building electric mobility coalitions in Black communities to envision and lead their electric mobility futures using Afrofuturism to center the lived experiences of Black people in technological innovation
Addressing the workforce underrepresentation of Black workers and thinkers in the clean energy labor force and finding pathways for upward mobility and economic empowerment through green jobs and entrepreneurship
EBF will leverage community-based participatory research and authentic community engagement to identify and understand community needs and priorities, develop community-centered strategic plans, and empower community voices to ensure that electric mobility investments from federal programs such as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) deliver what communities need and want.
Laying the Groundwork
To see where we’re going, we must know where we come from. Black communities have had a painful relationship in the U.S. with transportation and energy in both past and recent history. Largely obscuring our historical contributions toward clean energy by starting our story with enslavement is something our network is unveiling. From the system built on the metabolic energy of enslaved ancestors to the the Jim Crow and Civil Rights era. The movement and transportation of Black bodies has been connected to a cycle of harm for generations. In order to transform an energy and transportation system that can also reflect Black communities’ wants and dreams, Electric Black Futures recognizes there needs to be a coordinated effort in sharing access to awareness, education, and funding that spearheads and directs people to the forefront of e-mobility initiatives and projects.
As we build a future powered by clean transportation, it is imperative that those facing the greatest challenges are prioritized in the planning process. Through deep listening sessions and documentation of community stories and thorough assessment of community needs and dreams, we will harness community input to develop actionable strategies aligned with local, state, and federal e-mobility initiatives, workforce training programs, industry investments, and job opportunities to demand that Black Georgians should be at the heart of their own communities’ innovations.
Black Sustainability, Inc. is currently supporting this initiative through consulting and establishing Community Advisory Boards with local partners to help lead engagement with the cities’ underserved Black communities. As we move forward, Electric Black Futures will be informed by authentic community voices. We too are looking forward to seeing how EBF will unfold in Georgia over the next three years.
Looking Toward the Next Steps
In addition to developing strategic plans and identifying pathways to electric mobility project funding, the project will also engage education partners, including the Technical Community College System of Georgia and local Historically Black Colleges and Universities, to identify job skill gaps and ensure communities have access to the job training needed to participate in the state’s booming electric transportation sector.
EBF’s success will help inform and achieve the objectives of the Justice40 initiative, by which the Biden administration seeks to deliver 40% of the benefits from national clean energy and climate investments to underserved communities disproportionately affected by environmental and socioeconomic challenges.
To participate in and stay connected to EBF, visit ElectricBlackFutures.org.
Electric Black Futures is integrated into BSI's Alternative Energy Industry House leveraging wisdom and input from experts and entity members in our network to accelerate the equitable transition to electric transportation across the Southeast.
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