The pace of governed energy transitions: agency, international dynamics and the global Paris agreement accelerating decarbonisation processes?

The recent debate on the temporal dynamics of energy transitions is crucial since one of the main reasons for embarking on transitions away from fossil fuels is tackling climate change. Long-drawn out transitions, taking decades or even centuries as we have seen historically, are unlikely to help achieve climate change mitigation targets. Therefore, the pace of energy transitions and whether they can be sped up is a key academic and policy question. Our argument is that while history is important in order to understand the dynamics of transitions, the pace of historic transitions is only partly a good guide to the future. We agree with Sovacool’s [1] argument that quicker transitions have happened in the past and may therefore also be possible in the future globally. The key reason for our optimism is that historic energy transitions have not been consciously governed, whereas today a wide variety of actors is engaged in active attempts to govern the transition towards low carbon energy systems. In addition, international innovation dynamics can work in favour of speeding up the global low-carbon transition. Finally, the 2015 Paris agreement demonstrates a global commitment to move towards a low carbon economy for the first time, thereby signalling the required political will to foster quick transitions and to overcome resistance, such as from incumbents with sunk infrastructure investments

Perceived barriers and policy solutions in clean energy infrastructure investment

International political negotiations and national policy for climate change mitigation are increasingly focussed on the mobilisation and scale up of investments in clean energy infrastructure. This paper aims to develop the understanding of how institutional investors in the private sector perceive barriers to scaling up investment into clean energy infrastructure and what policy solutions to those barriers they advocate. This paper adds to existing scientific knowledge through a clear focus on private sector perceptions. Through the analysis of previous public statements from organisations and coalitions in the finance sector a number of investment barriers were identified. These initial barriers fed into a Delphi process. The outputs of the Delphi process were categorized into five sets of barriers and a number of policy solutions associated with investing into clean energy solutions. We conclude that there is a need for better engagement with the institutional investment community to ensure further effort on policy development that underpins investments at scale is effective and efficient

Importance of non-CO2 emissions in carbon management

Background: GHG budgets highlight a need for urgency, yet analyses are often CO2-focused, with less attention paid to non-CO2. Results: In this paper, scenarios are used to explore non-CO2 drivers and barriers to their mitigation, drawing out implications for CO2 management. Results suggest that even optimistic technological and consumption-related developments lead to on-going increases in global N2O, largely to improve food security within a changing climate. This contrasts with existing analysis, where lower levels of N2O by 2050 are projected. Conclusions: As avoiding '2°C' limits the emissions budget, constraints on reducing non-CO2 add pressure to energy system decarbonization. Overlooking how a changing climate and rising consumption restricts efforts to curb non-CO2 will result in policies aiming to avoid 2°C falling short of the mark

Competing coalitions: The politics of renewable energy and fossil fuels in Mexico, South Africa and Thailand

This paper analyses why middle-income countries incentivize renewable energy despite inexpensive domestic fossil fuel resources and lack of international support. We examine the politics of renewable energy programs in Mexico, South Africa and Thailand. All three countries hold abundant local fossil fuel and renewable energy resources. We argue that renewable energy programs become implementable policy options in fossil fuel resource-rich middle-income countries when coalitions of powerful political actors support them. This study presents an analysis of the domestic coalitions in support of and those in opposition to renewable energy policies from a discourse network perspective. Discourse networks reflect actors and the arguments they share to advance or hamper the policy process. The analysis draws on a data set of 560 coded statements in support or opposition of renewable energy from media articles, policy documents and interviews. Findings show similar structures of competing coalitions in all three countries, with the discourse in all three countries revealing strong linkages between environmental and economic considerations

The ‘Black Box’ problem of orchestration: how to evaluate the performance of the Lima-Paris Action Agenda

The Lima-Paris Action Agenda (LPAA), launched in 2014 to mobilize non-state and subnational climate action in the run-up to the 21st Conference of the Parties (COP21) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), is conceptualized as an orchestration attempt where the French COP21 and Peruvian COP20 presidencies together with the United Nation Secretary General’s office and the UNFCCC Secretariat enlisted non-state and subnational actors to influence states. Using a method seldom used in global governance research to reconstruct the intervention theory of the LPAA, the assumptions and expectations underpinning its performance are unveiled, suggesting a series of micro-steps between input, output and outcome that the evaluator must link causally to understand the LPAA’s performance. This contributes insights for orchestration theory and global climate policy, suggesting that leadership and institutional environment were conducive for the LPAA’s creation. The benefits and challenges of reconstructing intervention theory in global governance research are also discussed