Date: 27 September
Time: 10.15 - 12.00

Session program

Anders Rhiger Hansen: The rich still consume the most: A register-analysis of energy consumption among Danish high-income households Gerrit Stöckigt: The role of low- and high-income groups in the traffic decarbonization in Germany 
Cornelius Heyse: Justice and equity in sustainability transitions 
Line Valdorff Madsen: Coping with the energy crisis: Households’ socio-material solutions to rising energy prices 
Thomas Berker: Splintering Furuset: The history and potential effects of an urban climate mitigation pilot 
Indra de Soysa: Green with Envy! Do more unequal societies emit higher greenhouse gases? An empirical test with novel data, 1990-2020 
Ruth Woods: (Reserve) Frugality, sharing and carefulness: Poverty and sustainable practices in the homes of low-income households 
Robert Næss: (Reserve): Ensuring inclusive and sustainable mobility: Examining the role of low-income groups in Norway’s transportation transition 

Sustainability policy that lacks eco-social solutions encourages an entrenchment of socio-economic segregation. Despite sustainability being associated with reduction, in CO2 production and in consumption. The causal link between high consumption, carbon footprints and high income still holds true for the wealthy. Where attempts to cut down their ecological footprint are materialized in the acquirement of gadgets and devices with advanced technologies belonging to a high-price segment. Cost-intensive redesigning has become part of and an expression of what can be called eco-habitus in which notions of sustainability and “the green shift” manifest themselves in distinctive high-tech and low-energy solutions for their homes.  

In contrast, low-income households are excluded from engaging with socio-material solutions and are instead dependent on low-tech even no-tech actions. Sustainability is increasing a burden that low-income citizens bear alone, whilst wealthier less sustainable sections of society are socio-materially insulated from climate change through ambitious and subsidized energy efficiency technologies.  

We welcome papers that explore challenges of sustainability transitions from the perspectives of different socio-economic groups, focusing on how differences in access to technological, economic and social resources shape capabilities for change.

Organizers

Cornelius Heyse, Department of Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture, NTNU
Ruth Woods, Department of Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture, NTNU

Contact: Cornelius Heyse 

Lea Marie Sasse 

The global electric vehicle (EV) market is developing dynamically, with rapid growth in EV penetration and concomitant ethical and geopolitical supply chain concerns. Particularly in Europe and the US, an increase in commitment and industrial strategies to support the domestic EV industry is observable. While there is a clean and green narrative surrounding EVs, the social and ecological implications of the electrification of the road transport sector are still associated with significant uncertainties.

In the case of the Tesla Gigafactory in Grünheide, Germany, the establishment revealed various interests and conflicts, including hopes for regional development with green job creation and innovation. At the same time, Gigafactory opponents, such as environmental groups and local residents, raised concerns against the environmental and social impacts and criticised the expedited approval process.

Date: 28 September
Time: 12.30 - 14.00

Landscapes are woven by the experiences of their inhabitants and visitors, human and more-than-human. And yet, even as there is a deepening recognition that humans must transform their relationship with nature in response to the devastation wrought by climate change and species extinction, all too often, visions for the future are dominated by the same limited logics that generated the damage.    

Transition is often imagined in government and policy circles as a strategic and large-scale process, demanding interventions that are planned at regional or national levels. In this kind of vision, particular places and landscapes can be reduced to opportunity sites for development on a map.  

It is with mapping in mind that we present “Tender Cartographies”, an exercise exploring our felt relationship to place, with the intention of opening up discussion around how just transitions might be led by place, rather than by overcoming it in favour of industrial developments designed to radically transform it.  

After presenting an example from our research, we will ask participants to reflect on their relationship with place by creating their own sensory and experiential maps.  

The session will explore questions such as: 

• What does it mean to know and be connected to a place, and to map it from our felt experience of relationship with the human and non-human beings that inhabit and move through it?
• What might just transition look and feel like if its starting point were place and the beings that compose it?
• What does it mean to be placed in the world?
• What and whose knowledge is valued and taken into account in transition processes? 

We invite researchers interested in alternative methods as well as other participants interested in sustainable transitions to do this exercise in a green space near the conference venue. 

Organizers

Annabel Pinker (1) and Kornelia Johansson (2) 

(1) Social, Economic and Geographical Sciences, James Hutton Institute , Aberdeen, UK , (2) Divison of Environmental Communication, Department of Urban and Rural Development, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences , Uppsala, Sweden