New energy projects, as many other infrastructural projects, raise issues of acceptance at both the local and national levels. These issues depend on the technologies under consideration and on the ways in which they are frame by public policies and developed. A few real case studies will be considered in order to understand the reasons for tensions around energy technologies and the ways in which these can be acknowledged, and possibly addressed.

Course syllabus:

• Technology as a socio-tehcnical assemblage

• Socio-technical controversy and the role of the public

• Social acceptance, nimby (reach and limits) and the notion of 'public'

Learning objectives:

• Understand current issues with energy transition processes, the role of public policies

• Understand technology as inseparably social and technical

• Identify and map the issues at stake around specific new energy projects on different levels (international, national local)

• Understand local opposition as a social and political process, how to analyse it, and reflect on how to address it.

Assessment: Presentation and analysis of a case study