How to account for the dark sides of social innovation? Transitions directionality in renewable energy prosumerism

•Transitions research needs to engage with the dark sides of social innovation.•Renewable energy prosumerism exemplifies the dark sides of social innovation.•Discussions of dark sides hover between naive optimism and paralyzing critique.•Transitions directionality is a key concept to account for the dark sides.•A heuristic discloses a variegated zone of balanced dark sides understandings.