The Investor Group on Climate Change’s (IGCC) recently released State of Net Zero Investment 2026 report is a welcome reminder that the fundamentals of Australia’s energy transition remain strong.
Capital is available. Investors continue to see compelling long-term opportunities in renewable energy, storage and transmission. The strategic case for the transition has not weakened.
Yet there is an uncomfortable reality sitting alongside that optimism.
Many of the projects needed to deliver the transition are facing growing resistance from local communities. Wind farms, transmission corridors, renewable energy zones and associated infrastructure are facing delays, escalating costs and growing political division. In some regions, opposition is becoming more organised, more sophisticated and more influential.
For years, much of the sector’s response to resistance has centred on improving communications and community consultation and engagement. These remain essential. But what if community resistance is no longer primarily a communication challenge?
Our research into social licence in the energy sector suggests a more complex picture. Looking across Australian and international projects, we found that successful projects consistently met five conditions: communities understood why development was needed, accepted why it was happening in their area, believed the benefits outweighed the costs, had meaningful influence over outcomes, and trusted those leading the project.
The finding that stands out is not that communication matters. It does. The more significant insight is that communities increasingly want to understand how individual projects fit into a broader vision for their region’s future.
Australia’s energy transition represents a once-in-a-century economic transformation. For many regions, it will shape land use, employment, investment and community identity for decades. Against that backdrop, project-by-project engagement can feel insufficient. Communities may accept the need for the transition while still questioning whether individual developments contribute to a future they want to be part of.
The IGCC report highlights the importance of maintaining investor confidence and accelerating delivery. Those objectives are critical. But delivery risk is not only a technical, regulatory or financial challenge. Increasingly, it is a social one.
To succeed, projects will need to move beyond transactional engagement and help communities understand, influence and benefit from a broader regional vision. That does not mean communities can determine every aspect of infrastructure planning. Nor does it remove the need for difficult decisions and trade-offs. But social licence is more likely to result from a spirit of partnership rather than persuasion alone.
As Australia enters the “messy middle” of the transition, it is important for the sector to reflect on how best to bring communities along. If resistance persists despite ever-greater investment in engagement, consultation and benefit-sharing, what needs to change? How do we balance the urgency of delivery with the need to build lasting trust? And what role should communities play in shaping the future of the regions that will host so much of Australia’s new energy infrastructure?
The answers will help determine not only the pace of the transition, but its legitimacy and durability.
Because ultimately, social licence is not something that can be secured through communication alone. It comes when communities can see a future worth supporting, and believe they have a meaningful stake in creating it.
