The data and cyberinfrastructure teams at Alaska Center for Energy and Power (ACEP) share how we assess our own handling of energy data from the framework of ethical, equitable engagement, and community-led energy transitions. Our assessment particularly focuses on how we can center community-level decision-making and Indigenous leadership in the process of working with community energy data. We created this assessment tool to ensure we are sufficiently prioritizing relationship-building, societal benefits, and long-term collaboration with and for the benefit of Indigenous communities that partner with ACEP on energy research. ACEP’s data and cyberinfrastructure self-assessment is part of a large emphasis andresearch inquiry into how socio-technical data systems can be designed to align with both community and researcher objectives. In the future we hope to apply this tool in team “retrospectives” to continuously improve our internal processes, as well as analyze case studies from ACEP’s research where communities are leading energy transitions, demonstrating how community ownership of energy data and projects ensures equity and long-term success. In the process, research team also reflected on how the assessment incorporates Kawerak-Region Tribal Research Protocols, Guidelines, Expectations, and Best Practices (Kawerak, 2024), the Circumpolar Inuit Protocols for Ethical and Equitable Engagement (ICC, 2021), the SAON ROADS process (Starkweather et al, 2021), and the CARE principles (GIDA, 2020) - seminal works that play a role in helping ACEP to effectively support Indigenous data sovereignty and fostering trust in energy data research.

CRediTElizabeth Dobbins - investigation, project administration, conceptualizationWilliam Fisher - investigation, project administration, conceptualizationDominique Pride - validationVanessa Raymond - Conceptualization, Funding acquisition, investigation, methodology, projectadministration, supervision, visualization, writing - original draft, writing - reviewing & editing

A version 1.0 flowchart to show the decisions and decisionmaking process to go from research question to data collection in a community-engaged research practice. This flowchart reflects and documents the data culture and practices of the data science and cyberinfrastructure and research teams at Alaska Center for Energy and Power at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

Symbology for flowchart shapes diamonds questions or decision points parallelograms data inputs or outputs rectangles processes ovals start or end arrows connector, shows relationships