Sustainability research as inter- and trans-disciplinary activity: the case of German Energiewende
Armin Grunwald
Institute for Technology Assessment and Systems Analysis (ITAS), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), P.O. Box 3640, 76021 Karlsruhe (Germany)
Abstract
Sustainability research shall provide knowledge for action and is therefore deeply related with social and political issues such as regulation, behaviour, value-added chains, daily routines of users, consumption patterns, economic incentives, perceptions, attitudes and values. It needs cooperation with social actors in diagnosing sustainability deficits and challenges, in determining priorities for research and action, in defining indicators for measuring empirical developments and deciding on sustainability targets to go for, in setting the research agenda, in bringing knowledge and values of stakeholders and affected persons into the game and in looking for making sustainability strategies work in practice. This holds in particular for the transformation of the energy supply system to a more sustainable status. This transformation goes far beyond the substitution of traditional technology by new ones, because the energy system is not a purely technical system consisting of power plants, supply lines, storages etc. Rather it also includes a complex set of human actors such as users, regulators, decision-makers, planners, innovators, employees in the supply companies, citizens affected by side effects of energy technologies and infrastructures and also citizens in their role as the democratic sovereign. The main thesis of this paper is that the energy system is a socio-technical system and that its transformation is a social transformation including technological change but going far beyond. The German Energiewende is used as an example. Energiewende means the (relatively) fast transformation of the German energy infrastructure to a more sustainable status based on a high share of renewables and strongly increased energy efficiency, including an accelerated nuclear phase-out after the Fukushima disaster.
Keywords:
sustainable energy supply, socio-technical systems, transition management, social learningReferences
BANSE G., JANIKOWSKI R., KIEPAS A. (eds.), Zrównoważony rozwój – ponadnarodowo. Spojrzenia i doświadczenia z Europy Środkowej, Edition Sigma, Berlin 2010.
Google Scholar
BANSE G., NELSON G. L., PARODI O. (eds.), Sustainable development – The Cultural perspective, Concepts – aspects – examples, Edition Sigma, Berlin 2011.
Google Scholar
BANSE G., PARODI O., Kulturowe uwarunkowania rozwoju zrównoważonej gospodarki opartej na wiedzy, in: Uwarunkowania Rozwoju Zrównoważonej Gospodarki opartej na wiedzy, ed. Poskrobko B., EkoPress, Białystok 2011, p. 31-46.
Google Scholar
CAMHIS M., Planning Theory and Philosophy, London 1979.
Google Scholar
FUNTOWICZ S. RAVETZ J., 1993, Science for the post-normal age, in: Futures 25 (7), p. 739-755.
Google Scholar
GEELS F.W., 2012, Processes and patterns in transitions and system innovations: Refining the co-evolutionary multi-level perspective, in: Technol. Forecast. Soc. Change 72(6), p. 681-696.
Google Scholar
GRUNWALD A., 2004, Strategic knowledge for sustainable development: the need for reflexivity and learning at the interface between science and society, in: International Journal of Foresight and Innovation Policy 1(2004)1/2, p. 150-167.
Google Scholar
GRUNWALD A., 2007, Working Towards Sustainable Development in the Face of Uncertainty and Incomplete Knowledge, in: Journal of Environmental Policy & Planning, Vol. 9, Issue 3, p. 245-262.
Google Scholar
GRUNWALD A., Technology Assessment: Concepts and Methods, in: Philosophy of Technology and Engineering Sciences, vol. 9, ed. Meijers A., Amsterdam 2009, p. 1103-1146.
Google Scholar
GRUNWALD A., KOPFMüLLER J., Nachhaltigkeit. Frankfurt, New York 2012.
Google Scholar
GRUNWALD A., Technology Policy Between Long-Term Planning Requirements And Short-Ranged Acceptance Problems, in: Vision Assessment: Shaping Technology in 21st Century Society, eds. Grin J., Grunwald A., Springer, Heidelberg 2000, p. 99-148.
Google Scholar
GRUNWALD A., 2011, Energy futures: Diversity and the need for assessment, in: Futures 43, p. 820-830.
Google Scholar
HUBER J., Nachhaltige Entwicklung. Strategie für eine ökologische und soziale Erdpolitik, Berlin 1995.
Google Scholar
JAHN T., BERGMANN M., KEIL F., 2012, Transdisciplinarity: between mainstreaming and marginalization, in: Ecological Economics 79, p. 1-10.
Google Scholar
JONAS, H., Das Prinzip Verantwortung. Frankfurt. Frankfurt 1979.
Google Scholar
KATES R. W., CLARK W. C., CORELL, R., HALL J. M., JAEGER C., LOWE I., McCARTHY J. J., SCHELLNBUBER H.-J., BOLIN B., DICKSON N. M., FAUCHEUZ S., GALLOPIN G. C., GRUEBLER A., HUNTLEY B., JäGER J., JODHA N. S., KASPERSON R. E., MABOGUNJE A., MATSON P., MOONEY H., MOORE B., O’RIORDAN T., SVEDIN U., 2000, Sustainability Science, in: Science 292, p. 641-642.
Google Scholar
KOPFMüLLER J., BRANDL V., JöRISSEN J., PAETAU M., BANSE G., COENEN R., GRUNWALD A., Nachhaltige Entwicklung integrativ betrachtet. Konstitutive Elemente, Regeln, Indikatoren, Berlin 2001.
Google Scholar
KOWALSKI Z., KULCZYCKA J., GORALCZYK M., Ekologiczna ocena cyklu życia procesów wytwórczych LCA, PWN, Warsaw 2007.
Google Scholar
LUHMANN N., Die Wissenschaft der Gesellschaft, Frankfurt 1990.
Google Scholar
NOWOTNY H., SCOTT P., GIBBONS M., Re-Thinking Science. Knowledge and the Public in an Age of Uncertainty, Polity, Oxford 2001.
Google Scholar
OTT K., DöRING R., Theorie und Praxis starker Nachhaltigkeit, Marburg 2004.
Google Scholar
RESCHER, N., Predicting the future. An introduction to the theory of forecasting, Albany, NY 1998.
Google Scholar
ROHRACHER H., 2008, Energy systems in transition: contributions from social sciences, in: Int. J. Environmental Technology and Management, vol. 9, no 2/3, p. 144-161.
Google Scholar
ROPOHL G., Eine Systemtheorie der Technik. Zur Grundlegung der Allgemeinen Technologie, Suhrkamp, Frankfurt 1979.
Google Scholar
SCHELLNNHUBER H.-J., WENZEL V. (eds.), Earth Systems Analysis. Integrating Science for Sustainability, Berlin 1000, p. 3-195.
Google Scholar
SCHIPPL J, GRUNWALD A., Energieinnovationen zwischen Gesellschaft und Technik, Die HGF-Allianz Energy-Trans. Konferenzbeitrag, Graz 2012.
Google Scholar
SCHNEIDEWIND U., Nachhaltige Wissenschaft. Plädoyer für einen Klimawandel im deutschen Wissenschafts und Hochschulsystem, Marburg 2010.
Google Scholar
SPANGENBERG J., Sustainability Science: a review, an analysis and some empirical lessons, in: Environmental Conservation 38 (3), p. 275-287.
Google Scholar
VERBONG G., LOORBACH L. (Hg., 2012): Governing the Energy Transition. Reality, Illusion or Necessity? Routledge, New York, London 2012.
Google Scholar
von SCHOMBERG, R., The objective of Sustainable Development: Are we coming closer?, in: EU Foresight Working Papers Series 1, Commission of the European Union. Brussels 2002.
Google Scholar
VOSS J.-P., BAUKNECHT D., KEMP R. (eds.) Reflexive Governance for Sustainable Development. Cheltenham 2006.
Google Scholar
WBGU (Wissenschaftlicher Beirat Globale Umweltveränderungen), Welt im Wandel. Gesellschaftsvertrag für eine große Transformation, Berlin 2011.
Google Scholar
WCED (World Commission on Environment and Development), Our common future, Oxford University Press, New York 1987.
Google Scholar
Authors
Armin GrunwaldInstitute for Technology Assessment and Systems Analysis (ITAS), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), P.O. Box 3640, 76021 Karlsruhe Germany
Statistics
Abstract views: 15PDF downloads: 7
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
