Energy efficiency left behind? Policy assemblages in Sweden’s most climate-smart city

Abstract

Smart city experiments have the potential to reshape urban climate change governance. Smart city initiatives have been supported by international technology companies and the European Union for many years and continue to be promoted by national and municipal governments. In relation to sustainability and climate change, such initiatives promise more efficient use of resources through the use of information and communications technology in energy infrastructure. Experiments with smart city technologies such as urban smart grids have shown the potential to restructure relationships between energy utilities, energy users and other actors by reconfiguring the dynamics of energy supply and demand. But do urban experiments lead to institutional change? The aim of the article is to provide a better understanding of how smart city experiments reshape the urban governance of building energy use. Hyllie, a new city district in Malmö, Sweden, was home to two smart city experiments that contributed to the institutionalization of urban smart grid technology. However, the analysis of Hyllie's policy assemblages shows that this institutional change could redefine sustainability at the expense of energy efficiency. ARTICLE HISTORY

Municipalities as intermediaries for the design and local implementation of climate visions

“…the Climate Change Alliances in Horne and Moloney (2018)), a developer (e.g. Parks, 2019) or a municipally-owned company (e.g. the London Climate Change Agency in Hodson et al (2013)).…”

Obduracy and Change in Urban Transport—Understanding Competition Between Sustainable Fuels in Swedish Municipalities

“…Linköping has gained widespread attention primarily because of their sustainable resource use and their biogas system [9,[28][29][30]39]. Malmö, in contrast, has a more general sustainability profile since the launch of the Bo01 housing project in the Western Harbor in 2001 and more recently with aims of becoming "Sweden's most climate-smart city" by 2020 [40][41][42]. These different profiles mirror the way that sustainability is defined in each case.…”

Analysing the Institutional Setting of Local Renewable Energy Planning and Implementation in the EU: A Systematic Literature Review

“…In the 24 selected articles, 65 case studies were analysed in total. The information provided on the participating stakeholders, however, has to be treated with caution, especially due to the following two reasons: (1) It is not possible for us to validate whether all stakeholders have been reported for each case; (2) in a few articles [38,49,59] stakeholders were aggregated-e.g., only referred to as third sector or private sector actors. These aggregated actors have not been included in Figure 5.…”

“…In addition, a lack of information about laws and regulations was reported (e.g., in [58]). An exception to the negative view on laws and regulations is the 'Hyllie Environmental Programme' [49] that stated that renewable energy should be considered early on in spatial planning and building processes.…”