The sustainability of sugarcane-ethanol systems in Guatemala: land, labour and law

Since 2010, Guatemala has been exporting ethanol, principally to European markets. This means that Guatemalan biofuel has been certified sustainable, although this is deeply contested with NGO reports drawing attention to the negative impacts of ‘agrofuels’, particularly for marginalised communities. Guatemala therefore provides an excellent case study for examining not only the impacts of increased global demand for biofuels, but also whether sustainability, as conceptualised by the European Union’s Renewable Energy Directive, can capture those issues that are salient to the Guatemalan context. Drawing on more than eighty qualitative, in-depth interviews, this paper finds that the bloc’s governance framework for biofuels fails to capture many of the issues that matter most to local people in Guatemala, namely land access, trade unions and compliance with the law. This paper argues that the current framework therefore runs the risk of exacerbating the plight of Guatemala’s already marginalised rural communities

Electricity in Central America: paradigms, reforms and the energy trilemma

A new global energy era is emerging, one driven by the confluence of energy security, climate politics and energy equity issues. This ‘energy trilemma’ is shaping the global political economy of energy, which in turn influences how decisions are made about how energy is provided—referred to as global energy governance. This article analyzes historical and contemporary developments in Central America’s power sectors. This is a region that has long been an implementation space for global policy priorities, but has been overlooked by those engaging with the challenges of the energy trilemma. During the 1990s and 2000s, the statist model of energy governance gave way to a market-led model in the Central American isthmus. This led to the privatization of state-owned utilities and the promotion of a regional electricity market. During this period, the dominance of largely hydro-based renewable electricity generation diminished to be replaced by imported fossil fuel-based generation. Oil price increases during the early 2000s highlighted the region’s dependence on imports, with some countries turning to energy rationing. Increasingly interventionist state policies, which now seek to reduce oil dependence, improve energy efficiency and expand access to electricity, are being pursued in the region. This interventionist turn reflects the pressures of the energy trilemma, although energy security, particularly the need to reduce dependence on imported oil, remains the most important driver

United Kingdom: An example of the impact of high stakes accountability regimes on STEM education

In this chapter we focus on science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education in the United Kingdom. We examine government policy and describe various strategies and programmes that have been designed and implemented with a view to improving the system. The UK, and particularly England, provides a case study of high stakes accountability regimes. Root and branch reforms have seen major changes in curriculum and assessment at a number of levels as well as an attempt to impose a national pedagogic strategy

Representations of people in Urban Building Energy Models

Occupant behaviour is commonly acknowledged as a key driver for variation in building energy performance (Gaetani et al., 2016). ASHRAE (2009) notes it as an important factor in the significant discrepancy between proposed building performance and actual energy consumption. A large body of literature exists dedicated to exploring energy behaviours and the need for more holistic considerations of energy behaviours, but this has not been connected to occupant modelling in Urban Building Energy Models (UBEMs). This paper develops a framework to identify and classify representations of people in UBEMs by reviewing and connecting the behaviour change and UBEM literatures. Combined with the classification of the approaches of people’s representation, we show that schedule-based models perform better although it cannot provide a full explanation of energy practices. While agent-based approaches offer the potential to incorporate the more holistic approaches called for by Kierstead (2006) the computational burdens which result may be excessive at the urban scale. The main framework developed can provide simulation practitioners with insights into energy behaviours

Bridging the divide? Integrating stakeholder values into energy system models

Delivering just energy transitions in sub-Saharan Africa requires careful planning and consideration of diverse objectives. Recently in Energy Research and Social Science, Baker et al. provide a useful method for eliciting stakeholder preferences in Ghana; however, they do not take the next step and show how this evidence may be integrated into quantitative energy models

Energy scenario choices: insights from a retrospective review of UK energy futures

Since the 1980s, there has been a shift in energy research. It has shifted from approaches that forecast or project the future to approaches which make more tentative claims and which explore several plausible scenarios. Due to multiple uncertainties in energy systems, there is an infinite amount of plausible scenarios that could be constructed and scenario developers therefore choose smaller, more tangible sets of scenarios to analyse. Yet, it is often unclear how and why this scenario choice is made and how such choices might be improved. This paper presents a retrospective analysis of twelve UK energy scenarios developed between 1978 and 2002. It investigates how specific scenarios were chosen and whether these choices captured the actual UK energy system transition. It finds that scenario choice reflected contemporary debates, leading to a focus on certain issues and limiting the insights gleaned from these exercises. The paper argues for multi-organisation and multi-method approaches to the development of energy scenarios to capture the wide range of insights on offer. Rather than focus on uncertainty in model parameters, greater reflection on structural uncertainties, such as shifts in energy governance, is also required

Lessons from last mile electrification in Colombia: Examining the policy framework and outcomes for sustainability

More than a decade ago, Colombia reached a 95% electrification rate. Despite efforts from multiple actors, including government, private sector companies, communities and donors, this rate has only barely improved. In 2020, around 1.9 million Colombians – all residing in rural areas – lacked access to electricity. The electrification challenge is compounded by the geographical isolation of these last mile communities, which makes interconnection to the national electricity grid infeasible. Even where off-grid communities do have access to electricity, supply is often limited to less than six hours per day raising questions about the adequacy of provision. This paper investigates last mile electrification in Colombia, specifically examining the policy framework and the outcomes for the sustainability of last mile projects. Drawing on document analysis, expert interviews and case studies, this paper finds that the government has created an overly complex policy environment which hinders rather than facilitates electrification efforts. It also continues prioritizing the use of diesel generators through costly supply-side subsidies, resulting in high operating costs and inadequate service. More recently, although renewable sources have shown good outcomes, for instance in the case studies examined here, these experiences have not been extensible disseminated. Finally, this paper argues that changes are required to the institutional framework to deliver electricity to last mile communities in Colombia. Specifically, if the multidimensional benefits of electricity are to be realized, changes will need to include improvements in public infrastructure to promoting intersectoral work that promotes socio-economic development of last mile communities and beyond

Global policy and local outcomes: a political ecology of biofuels in Guatemala

The thesis is an investigation of how global processes intersect with local contexts to shape the outcomes of biofuels for different social groups within Guatemala. Its theoretical stance is drawn from political ecology, which argues that phenomena such as the development of biofuels cannot be understood in isolation from the political economic contexts within which they are embedded. The analysis begins with a description of the European Union’s evolving biofuels policy framework. It then turns to an examination of the outcomes in Guatemala, a country that has taken advantage of the opening up of global and specifically European markets for biofuels. The EU is by design one of the few markets to address the sustainability impacts of biofuels and the thesis examines the question of whether its objectives are being met. Since 2006, the production of biofuels, specifically sugarcane ethanol, in Guatemala has increased from almost nil to more than 94 million litres per year in 2011-12. Virtually all of this production was destined for the EU market, which has been an important driver of this growth. This makes Guatemala an excellent case study for examining not only the impacts of increased global demand for biofuels, but also whether sustainability governance, as developed by the EU, adequately captures those issues that are salient to producer country contexts. The main empirical basis of the research is a series of more than seventy interviews, field visits and personal observations drawn from eight months field work in Guatemala. Interviewees ranged from the ex-Minister for Energy to peasant farmers. There are also interviews with EU officials. The thesis argues that given Guatemala’s history of civil conflict, weak governance and unequal land tenure the likelihood of developing an equitable and sustainable biofuels sector as envisioned and understood by European policy actors – one which would deliver rural development and environmental benefits – appears limited