CEEN 590 Sustainable Energy as a Social and Political Challenge

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Today’s agenda

Engineers point to socio-political reasons

Why challenge is so formidable (Victor)

Carbon lock-in science-policy

dilemma Mooney (2)

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1. Delucchi, M.A. and Jacobson, M.Z., “Providing all global energy with wind, water, and solar power, Part II: Reliability, system and transportation costs, and policies,” Energy Policy 39 (2011) 1170–119. Read sections 4 and 5 only.

2. David G. Victor, Global Warming Gridlock, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), Chapter 2, “Why global warming is such a hard problem to solve.” (on-line UBC Library)

3. Gregory C. Unruh, “Understanding carbon lock-in,” Energy Policy 28 (2000) 817-830.

4. Chris Mooney, “The Science of Why We Don't Believe Science,” Mother Jones, May/June 2011,

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A vision of clean energy system

“We suggest producing all new energy with [water, wind, and solar] by 2030 and replacing the pre-existing energy by 2050. Barriers to the plan are primarily social and political, not technological or economic. The energy cost in a WWS world should be similar to that today”

Jacobson, M.Z., Delucchi, M.A., Providing all global energy with wind, water, and solar power, Part I: Technologies, energy resources, quantities and areas of infrastructure, and materials. Energy Policy (2010),

Victor’s 3 central political challenges

1. Very deep cuts to GHG emissions are required

Long residence time of CO2 in atmosphere – given rate of emissions stock is hard to reverse

2. Costs immediate, benefits uncertain and distant in time

“time inconsistency problem”3. Global nature of problem creates

spatial inconsistency: local costs, global benefits

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Hoberg’s version: Why climate action is so hard politically

Cost of MitigationBenefits of Mitigation

Relatively certain Highly uncertain

Now Distant in Time

Here Global

Victor’s 3 myths about policy process

Scientist’s myth: scientific research can determine the safe level of global warming

Environmentalist’s myth: global warming is a typical environmental problem

Engineer’s myth: once cheaper new technologies are available, they will be adopted

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Path Dependence

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Sustainable Energy Policy 9

Sustainable Energy Policy 10

Evolution of technical systems

Increasing returns result from Scale economies Learning economies Adaptive expectations Network economies

Sustainable Energy Policy 11

Techno-institutional complex

Not discrete technological artifactsComplex system of technologies

embedded in a powerful conditioning social context of public and private institutions

Technological systems – technological lock-in

Institutional lock-in Private organizations governmentalSustainable Energy Policy 12

February 2, 2011 Sustainable Energy Policy 13

Sustainable Energy Policy 14

Science and Politics

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Mooney

Deficit Model: “You just don’t understand” more information will resolve conflicts

and produce appropriate policy responseMembers of the public strain their

responses to science controversies through their value systems

Social science helps explain how this works

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Motivated reasoning (Mooney) motivated cognition: unconscious tendency to fit

processing of information to conclusions that suit some end or goal biased information search: seeking out (or

disproportionally attending to) evidence that is congruent rather than incongruent with the motivating goal

biased assimilation: crediting and discrediting evidence selectively in patterns that promote rather than frustrate the goal

identity-protective cognition: reacting dismissively to information the acceptance of which would experience dissonance or anxiety. 

Daniel Kahan, “What Is Motivated Reasoning and How Does It Work?, Science and Religion Today May 4, 2011.

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The politics of science: Classic view: separation

Science

(facts)

Politics

(values)

Truth

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Politics of Science:Recognition of “Trans-science”

Jasanoff and Wynne 1998

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Politics of ScienceConstructivist View

Politics

Science

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Politics of ScienceConstructivist View (when pressed)

Politics

Science

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Politics and Science

Policy reflects value judgments, but embodies causal assumptions

Causal knowledge frequently very uncertain, undermining power of science

actors adopt the scientific arguments most consistent with their interests

“science” becomes a contested resource for actors in the policy process, by lending credibility to arguments

the body of credible science bounds the range of legitimate arguments, but only loosely

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Politics and Science (cont)

Scientific controversies are frequently more about underlying value conflicts e.g., conservation vs. development

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A continuum

Science Politics

Regulatory Science

Regulatory Science: Scientific assumptions adopted for the purpose of policy-making

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Regulatory Science Approach Some causal assumptions are better than

others – science helps Some policies are better reflections of society’s

distribution of preferences than others -- democratic institutions help

Avoid: political decisions made by scientists and scientific judgments being made by politicians

Prefer: transparent justification for decisions Reveals boundary where scientific advice ends and

value judgments begins Promotes accountability

Next week

Formal governance

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