Call for Inputs: Human Rights in the Life Cycle of Renewable Energy and Critical Minerals

Feb 25, 2025 | UN Human Rights Office of the High Commisioner
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In her upcoming report to the UN General Assembly, the Special Rapporteur seeks to synthesise and analyse a varied body of evidence (from across the natural and social sciences, including Indigenous science and other knowledge systems) of the positive and negative human rights impacts of different sources, scales and stages to renewable energy development, throughout their full life cycle, including the extraction and re-use of critical minerals. On that basis, the report will seek to clarify States’ international human rights obligations, individually and as part of international cooperation, as well as business responsibility, to support a just transition while enhancing the protection of everyone’s human right to a healthy environment and the prevention of foreseeable negative human rights impacts of certain climate mitigation approaches. The obligations will be clarified giving due consideration to: the need to scale up global action and support in addressing climate change, including in averting, minimizing and addressing loss and damage associated with the adverse effects of climate change; and the principles of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, including the principle of equity and common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities, in the light of different national circumstances and in the context of sustainable development and efforts to eradicate poverty, all in pursuit of the objectives of the Convention and the Paris Agreement.

The call for inputs aims at advancing understanding of the documented positive and negative impacts on human rights of different sources, scales and stages of renewable energy development as part of a just transition, including in relation to critical minerals, throughout their life cycle. Inputs are expected to shed light on the diverse bodies of evidence of the positive and negative human rights impacts of renewables and critical minerals, on land and at sea, and assess alternative approaches that can better support an ecosystem-based and human rights-based approach. Inputs are also expected to share analysis of the current international law landscape relevant to renewables and critical minerals, identifying any areas that support or hinder the protection of human rights in the context of a just transition.