Experiments in climate governance – lessons from a systematic review of case studies in transition research

Experimentation has been proposed as one of the ways in which public policy can drive sustainability transitions, notably by creating or delimiting space for experimenting with innovative solutions to sustainability challenges. In this paper we report on a systematic review of articles published between 2009 and 2015 that have addressed experiments aiming either at understanding decarbonisation transitions or enhancing climate resilience. Using the case survey method, we find few empirical descriptions of real-world experiments in climate and energy contexts in the scholarly literature, being observed in only 25 articles containing 29 experiments. We discuss the objectives, outputs and outcomes of these experiments noting that explicit experimenting with climate policies could be identified only in 12 cases. Based on the results we suggest a definition of climate policy experiments and a typology of experiments for sustainability transitions that can be used to better understand the role of and learn more effectively from experiments in sustainability transitions

Special Issue on Experimentation for Climate Change Solutions Editorial: The search for climate change and sustainability solutions: the promise and the pitfalls of experimentation

This editorial highlights the diversity in studies of experimentation that aims for solutions to climate change and wider sustainability challenges. The diversity is reflected in the theoretical underpinnings, the agency behind experiments, the niches in which experimentation occurs, in the governance of the experiments and in experiments with governance, in the way experiments contribute to learning and sharing of knowledge across levels and scales. This implies that experimentation and experiments can contribute to transitions in very different ways and that experimentation also runs the risks of merely becoming a distraction that maintains status quo instead of contributing to transformative change. In moving forward research should explore the diversity even more, and critically evaluate and discuss the possible contributions to policy and polycentric governance

Impending doom or unnecessary panic? The struggle for discursive hegemony in South Africa's acid mine drainage policy problem

This article contributes to the literature on environmental policy controversies. We utilize an Argumentative Discourse Analysis (ADA)-based approachto analyze the struggle for discursive hegemony that took place between competing story-lines in the context of the acid mine drainage (AMD) environmental policy problem, located in the gold mining areas of greater Johannesburg, South Africa. With this article we make a theoretical contribution by presenting and applying an adapted ADA framework strongly focused on the operationalization of key ADA concepts. Our empirical contribution lies in providing a rich and deep analysis of an environmental policy controversy that has not yet been studied from an ADA perspective. In particular, we demonstrate and discuss the complex path to discourse institutionalization followed by the dominant emergent AMD story-line. In conclusion , we recommend steps for updating the ADA approach and developing an accompanying set of guidelines to further enable the operationalization of its concepts

Neo-Atlantis: Dutch Responses to Five Meter Sea Level Rise

What would happen to the Netherlands if, in 2030, the sea level starts to rise and eventually, after 100 years, a sea level of five meters above current level would be reached? Two socio-economic scenarios are developed from a literature review and by interviews with researchers and practicionersin the domains of social sciences, economics, civil engineering, and land use planning. One scenario describes what would happen in a future characterised by a trend towards further globalisation, marketisation and high economic growth, while the other scenario happens in a future under opposite trends. Under both scenarios, the Southwest and Northwest of the Netherlands – already now below seal level - would be abandoned because of sea level rise. Although most experts believe that geomorphology and current engineering skills allow to largely maintain the territorial integrity of the Netherlands, there are some reasons to assume that this is not likely to happen. Social processes that precede important political decisions – such as the growth of the belief in the reality of SLR and the framing of such decision in a proper political context (policy window) – evolve slowly. Although a flood disaster would speed up decision-making, the general expectation is that decisions would come too late in view of the rate of SLR and the possible pace of construction of works.Extreme sea level rise, The Netherlands, flood defences

Experiments in climate governance – a systematic review of research on energy and built environment transitions

Experimentation has been proposed as a key way in which governance drives sustainability transitions, notably by creating space for innovative solutions to emerge. In seeking to bring greater coherence to the literatures on climate and sustainability governance experiments, this article reports on a systematic review of articles published between 2009 and 2015. Based on these results a new definition and typology of climate governance experiments is suggested. The typology distinguishes between the various purposes experiments can have, including niche creation, market creation, spatial development, and societal problem solving. It deepens the understanding of the diversity in experimenting by highlighting the salient features of different types of governance experiments. It can therefore guide future research to generate more cumulative research findings contributing to a better understanding of the role and outcomes of experiments in societal transitions. The findings also suggests that real transitions towards low-carbon and climate-resilient societies will require a systematic deliberate combination of different types of experiments

Co-creation processes of nature based solutions in hydrological modelling:case studies in the UK, Belgium and the Netherlands

Climate adaptation of brook catchments is much needed in the studied regions of England, Belgium and the Netherlands. With the continuous rise of global temperatures and global change, these regions suffer from the impacts of extreme weather events such as drought and flooding. Extreme weather and climate change impacts are spatially non-uniform, uncertain and can have different strengths at local and regional level. Therefore, cities and regions need to adapt to climate change in an ambiguous way. Accordingly, there is no uniformity in the adaptive capacity of individuals, groups within society, organisations and governments or how they can respond to current and future climate change impacts. To better understand the interlinkages in nature-based climate adaptation between the socio-economic and climate change drivers, we studied these drivers in the hydrological modelling in 3 pilot studies in the UK, the Netherlands and Belgium. Focus is on how co-creation, defined as active participation is incorporated in the hydrological modelling process, (1) within each brook catchment and (2) between the professionals, as cross border knowledge transfer. Data on the co-creation process was collected with workshops on each of the semi-annual partner meetings of each catchment. Data on the modelling process was collected by semi-structured interviews of the professionals and by using assessment of professional learning in the network (field trips). Findings on co-creation processes of nature based solutions in hydrological modelling will be compared in the UK, the Netherlands and Belgium. In the end, existing co-creation processes will be joined to a framework for co-creation which can be improved and adapted based on the gathered data. This would include: identification of stakeholder groups and their needs, the level of intended participation, the identified climate problem by the stakeholders and by the policy-makers, the planned modelling approach, the NbS etc

Polycentric energy governance: Under what conditions do energy communities scale?

As the polycentric nature of climate governance becomes ever more apparent, understanding the role played by individual initiatives becomes an increasingly urgent research priority. In recent years, community initiatives have blossomed in relation to clean energy, both in their overall number and diversity. Polycentric governance thinking offers a powerful but incomplete account of how and why such initiatives emerge, grow, and replicate in different contexts, that is, how they “scale.” This article investigates the conditions under which different clean energy communities scale. Based on a systematic literature review, it identifies 23 separate conditions, which are subsequently categorized into what happens within, between and in the context of individual initiatives. As well as enriching polycentric governance thinking, this article identifies practical ways to inform and facilitate the emergence of new community initiatives

Mitigation and adaptation in polycentric systems: sources of power in the pursuit of collective goals

Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138383/1/wcc479_am.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138383/2/wcc479.pd