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The changing climate and its impacts on societies and environments constitute a defining societal challenge of the twenty-first century. The transition from fossil fuels to low-carbon renewable energy sources is considered an indispensable measure in mitigating this challenge. However, the increased extraction of energy transition-related resources (ETRs) has proved paradoxical, generating new and exacerbating pre-existing socio-economic and environmental challenges in extractive locales. Within this context, scholars have emphasized attention to ‘just transitions’. Yet, how such transitions might be realized remains contested and little understood.

This thesis addresses this knowledge gap by examining the emerging impacts of ETR extractivism in the case of Cabo Delgado province, Mozambique, and by exploring how such extractive processes might be governed toward a more just transition. Hosting multiple graphite and natural gas projects, Cabo Delgado is a prominent African destination for extractive capital targeting ETRs. The study employed the frontier approach and Africana Critical Theory as analytical lenses and combined qualitative and geospatial methods as its primary methodology. It historically contextualized the impacts of ETR extractivism in Cabo Delgado; examined the cumulative impacts of multiple ETR projects; analyzed the socio-economic contradictions to a just transition manifesting through this frontier; and explored the role of actor alliances in governing extraction processes toward a more just transition.

Grounded in an empirically rich African perspective centering people’s lived experiences, the thesis contributes to broader academic and policy debates on justice in energy transitions and climate responses.