Assessing change agency in urban experiments for sustainability transitions

Experimentation has become one of the prevailing modes of governing the transition toward sustainable practices in urban environments. The spatial variation of urban sustainability transition has been attributed to a variety of conditions erected at different spatial scales. What remains less well-understood is how spatial situatedness shapes agency in urban experiments and the shapes agency can take is a field that requires further research and frameworks. The paper addresses this gap by introducing a framework from the literature on regional development, identifying three distinct types of agency that shape regional development processes. Combining this framework with a process perspective on urban experiments, we develop an analytical framework, which allows for a more granular understanding of agency in urban sustainability transitions. The analytical framework is then brought to use in a case study of an urban experiment aiming to electrify public transport in Gothenburg, Sweden.publishedVersio

Realising the transition to bioenergy: Integrating entrepreneurial business models into the biogas socio-technical system in Uganda

This study assesses the entrepreneurial potential and feasibility of developing a mobile system for purifying and bottling biogas in portable cylinders for wider society consumption and benefit. Our findings reveal that existing research has neglected the entrepreneurial potential in biogas energy that could increase energy supply and access in developing countries. Therefore, using a multimethod approach, the paper provides a comprehensive analysis of how an entrepreneurial business model could be developed and integrated into the biogas socio-technical system in Uganda. The analysis from the transitional model canvas shows that current biogas users have a relatively high satisfaction rate (50%) and with the adoption of the entrepreneurial business model this satisfaction could be captured on a wider social spectrum. Results from the feasibility study indicate that by sourcing materials locally, system builders (entrepreneurs) achieve a marginal cost reduction of 64% compared to when they are imported. Both findings from the transitional model canvas and the feasibility study indicate a high probability of not only reducing the supply gap but also a reliable energy source for developing countries and a potential for income generation and employment for the wider society.publishedVersio

Faster, broader, and deeper! Suggested directions for research on net-zero transitions

The growing attention to the political goal of achieving net-zero emissions by mid-century reflects past failures to alter the trajectory of increasing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. As a consequence, the world now needs to decarbonize all systems and sectors at an unprecedented pace. This commentary discusses how the net-zero challenge presents transition scholarship with four enhanced research challenges that merit more attention: (1) the speed, (2) breadth and (3) depth of transitions as well as (4) tensions and interactions between these.Faster, broader, and deeper! Suggested directions for research on net-zero transitionspublishedVersio

Are rapid and inclusive energy and climate transitions oxymorons? Towards principles of responsible acceleration

Building from two strands of literature within “Sociotechnical agendas: Reviewing future directions for energy and climate research”, this perspective piece seeks to open a discussion about how to responsibly accelerate transitions. First, we identify a managerial literature on how innovation and diffusion can be accelerated, which focuses on deliberation with consensus-oriented ambitions. Second, is a set of perspectives that highlights unevenness, and therefore seeks to radically expand climate and energy democracy by promoting new forms of participatory practices. There are few contact points between these literatures. We argue that this can be explained by tensions and paradoxes that accompany accelerated transitions. These paradoxes cannot easily be resolved. We discuss how accelerated social and technological change poses challenges to inclusive and participatory transitions. Further, we discuss how rapid transitions tends to contribute to conflicts between core and peripheral sites. Thus, transitions are not only affected by societal conditions, but also contribute to co-producing social order, including the many forms of social turmoil currently experienced. Such insight places greater responsibilities on transition scholars, especially from reflexive disciplines such as STS and geography. We conclude by discussing how this responsibility could translate into situating climate and energy transition scholarship in broader debates about future socio-technical orders, and sketch three principles of responsible acceleration: a) Moving towards a broad epistemic basis for producing and assessing transition policies and strategies, b) Nurturing polycentrism for rapid climate and energy transitions, and c) Developing polytemporal strategies for transition

Are rapid and inclusive energy and climate transitions oxymorons? Towards principles of responsible acceleration

Building from two strands of literature within “Sociotechnical agendas: Reviewing future directions for energy and climate research”, this perspective piece seeks to open a discussion about how to responsibly accelerate transitions. First, we identify a managerial literature on how innovation and diffusion can be accelerated, which focuses on deliberation with consensus-oriented ambitions. Second, is a set of perspectives that highlights unevenness, and therefore seeks to radically expand climate and energy democracy by promoting new forms of participatory practices. There are few contact points between these literatures. We argue that this can be explained by tensions and paradoxes that accompany accelerated transitions. These paradoxes cannot easily be resolved. We discuss how accelerated social and technological change poses challenges to inclusive and participatory transitions. Further, we discuss how rapid transitions tends to contribute to conflicts between core and peripheral sites. Thus, transitions are not only affected by societal conditions, but also contribute to co-producing social order, including the many forms of social turmoil currently experienced. Such insight places greater responsibilities on transition scholars, especially from reflexive disciplines such as STS and geography. We conclude by discussing how this responsibility could translate into situating climate and energy transition scholarship in broader debates about future socio-technical orders, and sketch three principles of responsible acceleration: a) Moving towards a broad epistemic basis for producing and assessing transition policies and strategies, b) Nurturing polycentrism for rapid climate and energy transitions, and c) Developing polytemporal strategies for transition

Realising the transition to bioenergy: Integrating entrepreneurial business models into the biogas socio-technical system in Uganda

This study assesses the entrepreneurial potential and feasibility of developing a mobile system for purifying and bottling biogas in portable cylinders for wider society consumption and benefit. Our findings reveal that existing research has neglected the entrepreneurial potential in biogas energy that could increase energy supply and access in developing countries. Therefore, using a multimethod approach, the paper provides a comprehensive analysis of how an entrepreneurial business model could be developed and integrated into the biogas socio-technical system in Uganda. The analysis from the transitional model canvas shows that current biogas users have a relatively high satisfaction rate (50%) and with the adoption of the entrepreneurial business model this satisfaction could be captured on a wider social spectrum. Results from the feasibility study indicate that by sourcing materials locally, system builders (entrepreneurs) achieve a marginal cost reduction of 64% compared to when they are imported. Both findings from the transitional model canvas and the feasibility study indicate a high probability of not only reducing the supply gap but also a reliable energy source for developing countries and a potential for income generation and employment for the wider society

Understanding how city networks are leveraging climate action: experimentation through C40

Climate change is one of the most challenging environmental and social problems for contemporary urban planning. In response to this phenomenon, city networks have emerged as new configurations of urban climate governance that encourage the implementation of experiments such as testing new solutions regarding sustainable transport. While city networks are gaining momentum and influence as effective platforms to transform and scale up pilot experiments into city-wide schemes, little is known regarding their role in conditioning and leveraging such urban experiments Our paper investigates the underexplored nature of urban experiments within city networks and provides a better understanding of how these networks condition urban experiments. To this end an analytical model has been developed and applied to the case of the C40 Climate Leadership Group (C40) and its Climate Positive Development Good Practice Guide. Our findings suggest that the C40 encourages variation in local climate experiments and the generation of new and innovative climate solutions in member cities. In particular they reveal that the implementation of climate positive experiments has passed the ‘variation’ stage, is currently in the ‘selection’ stage, and likely to move towards the ‘retention’ stage in the near future. Potential experimentation outputs of the case are identified as built environment change, new citizen practices, policy change, infrastructural change and new technology. Noticeably, we consider that the C40 plays an important role in providing fundamental institutional support to implement and leverage climate projects within its member cities

Realising the transition to bioenergy: Integrating entrepreneurial business models into the biogas socio-technical system in Uganda

This study assesses the entrepreneurial potential and feasibility of developing a mobile system for purifying and bottling biogas in portable cylinders for wider society consumption and benefit. Our findings reveal that existing research has neglected the entrepreneurial potential in biogas energy that could increase energy supply and access in developing countries. Therefore, using a multimethod approach, the paper provides a comprehensive analysis of how an entrepreneurial business model could be developed and integrated into the biogas socio-technical system in Uganda. The analysis from the transitional model canvas shows that current biogas users have a relatively high satisfaction rate (50%) and with the adoption of the entrepreneurial business model this satisfaction could be captured on a wider social spectrum. Results from the feasibility study indicate that by sourcing materials locally, system builders (entrepreneurs) achieve a marginal cost reduction of 64% compared to when they are imported. Both findings from the transitional model canvas and the feasibility study indicate a high probability of not only reducing the supply gap but also a reliable energy source for developing countries and a potential for income generation and employment for the wider society

Effectuated sustainability: Responsible Innovation Labs for impact forecasting and assessment

Considering intractable uncertainties and the wicked nature of many sustainability challenges, there is a need to both forecast and assess the potential for improvements in sustainability with new ventures. While it is tempting to think of forecasting in terms of ‘predicting outcomes’, such an interpretation assumes a causal logic, failing to acknowledge the effectuation processes often at work in sustainability-focused innovative and entrepreneurial activity. In this paper, we argue that effectuation theory implies a new way of conceptualizing sustainability impact in such contexts. Leveraging the Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) concept, we develop an arena in which both impact forecasting and assessment can be achieved in line with effectuation processes via what we term a Responsible Innovation Lab (RIL), understood as a type of living lab. After examining the concept of RRI, we delve into effectuation theory, deriving relevant insights for sustainability impact in new venture contexts. We then present the RIL as a conceptual synthesis of RRI, living labs, and effectuation theory. Further leveraging effectuation theory, we develop two tools (the Responsible Innovation Tool and Responsible Impact Tool) to both guide multi-stakeholder sustainability-focused innovation activity in a RIL, as well as facilitate the development of context-specific methodologies for forecasting and assessing sustainability impacts

Place-Based Directionality of Innovation: Tasmanian Salmon Farming and Responsible Innovation

The aim of this paper has been to explore, in depth, the place-based conditions enabling and constraining the directionality of responsible innovation in the Tasmanian salmon farming industry, and to discuss how this case can inform the broader literature on directionality of innovations. Theoretically, we argue that the combination of literature on responsible research and innovation (RRI), regional innovation system (RIS) and discourse theory is a useful starting point for addressing innovation as a territorial complex consisting of a material dimension in terms of technologies and resources, an organizational dimension in terms of innovation systems and regulations, and a discursive dimension in terms of narratives in play. When applying the complex to analyze how place-based conditions have enabled and constrained the directionality of responsible innovation in the Tasmanian salmon industry, the case discerns that the directionality of responsible innovation arises from a rather mature and well-organized regional innovation system, which allows multiple stakeholders to articulate their narratives. Under such circumstances, responsible innovation becomes a multidimensional, interactive, and co-created phenomenon consisting of several dilemmas. Still, although the contextualization of responsible innovation is highlighted, our case study acknowledges that certain “universal” characteristics shine through. By this we mean that context sensitivity must not supersede the fact that place-based responsible innovation is always subject to some generic dynamism: under all circumstances there will be a territorial innovation complex at play