Overview

The current shift to renewable energy is dominated by globalised energy companies building large-scale wind and solar plants. This book discusses the consequences and possibilities of this shift in India, Germany, and Australia, focusing on regions which have now largely decarbonised electricity generation. The authors show how centralised models of energy provision are maintained, and chart their impacts in terms of energy geography, social stratification, and socio-ecological appropriation. The chapters emphasise the prominent role played by state regulation, financial incentives, and public infrastructure for corporate renewables, arguing that public provision should be re-purposed for distributed renewables, social equity in affected regions, and for wider social benefit. This interdisciplinary book provides fertile building ground for research in - and application of - future energy transitions. It will appeal to students, researchers, and policy makers from anthropology, sociology, politics and political economy, geography, and environmental and sustainability studies.

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9781009485616

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James Goodman is a Professor in Social and Political Sciences at the University of Technology Sydney. He has led two large Australian Research Council projects: Beyond the Coal Rush (2014-2017), and Decarbonising Electricity (2018-202). He is a co-author of Justice Globalism (Sage, 2013) and Climate Upsurge (Routledge, 2014). Gareth Bryant is Australian Research Council DECRA Fellow and Chair of the Discipline of Political Economy at the University of Sydney. His research explores the political economy of sustainability and inequality in a range of policy areas including climate change, energy, housing, and education. He is author of Carbon Markets in a Climate-Changing Capitalism (Cambridge University Press, 2019). Linda Connor is Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at the University of Sydney. She has conducted long-term ethnographic research on coal mining conflicts, climate change, and renewable energy in Hunter Valley communities and in South Australia. Her publications include Climate Change and Anthropos (Routledge, 2016). Devleena Ghosh is Honorary Professor in Social and Political Sciences at the University of Technology Sydney. She has published widely in colonial, global, and environmental history and is the co-author of Colonialism and Modernity (UNSW Press, 2007). She is currently working on a project on indigenous responses to fossil fuel extraction in India. Jonathan Paul Marshall is a Lecturer at the University of Technology Sydney, researching the problems of energy transition. He is co-editor of Environmental Change and the World's Futures (Routledge, 2016), and has also edited several journal issues on climate and energy, including with Energy Policy and Energy Research and Social Science. Tom Morton is an associate member of the Centre for Interdisciplinary Regional Studies (ZIRS) at the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg and is based in Sydney. He is co-editor of From Carbon Democracy to Climate Democracy (Routledge, 2024) and works as a freelance journalist and media convenor for the climate action group Rising Tide in Australia. Katja Müller works in the field of energy humanities, as well as digitization, museum studies, material culture, and visual anthropology. With a background in anthropology, she is Heisenberg-Professor for Technology, Ethics and Society at Merseburg University for Applied Sciences, conducting research into digitization processes in energy transitions. Stuart Rosewarne is an Honorary Associate Professor in Political Economy at the University of Sydney, focusing on environmental and ecological economics, socialist ecology, international political economy, and the political economy of gender. He is author of Contested Energy Futures: Capturing the Renewable Energy Surge in Australia (Palgrave, 2023). Riikka Heikkinen works in the renewable energy industry and is a Ph.D. candidate with the University of Technology Sydney. She is researching large-scale renewable energy support mechanisms and their impacts and is affiliated with several renewable energy research projects. She works hands-on with communities in large energy projects. Lisa Lumsden is a regional energy transition practitioner with The Next Economy. She has lived experience of energy transition, having served as Port Augusta City Councillor during the surprise closure of the Playford and Northern coal power stations in South Australia and the subsequent rise of renewables. She is a recipient of the Jill Hudson Award for Environmental Protection. Marieke Pampus is a postdoctoral researcher and lecturer in the Human Geography Department at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, and also serves as a scientific coordinator at the Centre for Just Transition and Sustainability. Her current postdoctoral research explores diverse nature concepts in land restoration of former lignite mining areas in the Central German Mining District. Priya Pillai has worked on environmental and social justice issues for over twenty years, including with Greenpeace, the Right to Food Campaign, Action Aid, and Oxfam, and is associated with the National Alliance of People's Movement (NAPM). She is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Technology Sydney, researching the socio-ecological impacts of large-scale renewable energy in India.

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