Energy transitions towards a low-carbon society. Highlighting the role of the human factor
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Date
2016
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AESOP
Abstract
Two major challenges are impending upon the world’s energy future: the achievement of a secure energy supply, and a move from dependency on non-renewable to a dependency on renewable energy sources. Both of them have become policy priorities for the European Union (EU) due to growing concerns about environmental challenges and the fact that the EU imports about half of its energy needs. In particular, the EU is dealing with climate policy and energy security jointly: both the Climate and Energy Package and the Energy Roadmap 2050 endorse the goals of reducing greenhouse gases emissions while at the same time ensuring security of energy supply. However, low-carbon transition and energy security are not always faces of the same coin. As a matter of fact, successful policies aiming at the former may undermine the conditions at the basis of the latter, and vice versa.
As a matter of fact, to pursue both challenges at the same time requires a fundamental shift of the present paradigms, often referred at as ‘energy transitions’: revisions that concern entire energy systems, not just some of their parts. These changes are structural, as they modify the way energy provision is organized at the level of society. They are radical, since they may demand abandoning existing technologies even if they still work, and even if the changes occur slowly and seemingly incrementally. And the changes are fundamental, because they require that we start thinking in novel ways about energy, its provision, and how a good and just society is organized around energy.
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Proceedings of the IV World Planning Schools Congress, July 3-8th, 2016 : Global crisis, planning and challenges to spatial justice in the north and in the south
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