Year: 2026 | Month: September | Volume: 13 | Issue: 9 | Pages: 271-286
DOI: https://doi.org/10.52403/ijrr.20260928
Inquiry-Based Learning in Renewable Energy Education: A Systematic Review of Conceptual Understanding, Energy Literacy, and Scientific Thinking Skills
Jumiati Ilham1, Purnamawati2, Yasser Abdul Djawad3, Jumadi Mabe Parenreng4
1,2,3,4Makassar State of University, Makassar, Indonesia
Corresponding Author: Jumiati Ilham
ABSTRACT
Renewable energy education has become an essential component of science, STEM, engineering, environmental, and sustainability education because energy transition requires learners who can understand complex energy systems, evaluate evidence, and reason about socio-scientific trade-offs. Inquiry-based learning is a promising pedagogical model for this purpose because it engages learners in questioning, investigation, data interpretation, explanation construction, and reflection. This systematic literature review synthesizes education-relevant renewable-energy studies from a Scopus-exported dataset containing 193 records. Because the dataset was dominated by technical, forecasting, optimization, and energy-management studies, the review adopted a focused title-and-abstract screening strategy to identify studies with direct or adjacent relevance to renewable energy education, learner outcomes, public education, workforce preparation, campus sustainability, community energy, and energy literacy. Thirty studies were included in the thematic synthesis. The findings indicate that renewable energy education is most frequently operationalized through engineering curriculum reform, micro-credentials, school and campus renewable-energy infrastructure, community-based projects, entrepreneurship education, workforce skills mapping, and public awareness initiatives. Across these contexts, inquiry-compatible learning is supported by authentic energy data, local energy problems, hands-on or simulation-based tasks, and socio-economic decision-making. The review argues that inquiry-based renewable energy education should move beyond factual content delivery toward conceptual understanding, energy literacy, scientific thinking, systems reasoning, and sustainability-oriented action competence. The article concludes with a conceptual framework and future research agenda for strengthening empirical inquiry-based renewable energy education.
Keywords: inquiry-based learning; renewable energy education; energy literacy; scientific thinking; conceptual understanding; sustainability education; STEM education
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