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Walker, G., Cass, N., Burningham, K., & Barnett, J. (2010). Renewable energy and sociotechnical change: Imagined subjectivities of'the public'and their implications. Environment and Planning A, 42(4), 931-947
Walker, G., & Cass, N. (2007). Carbon reduction,‘the public’and renewable energy: engaging with socio‐technical configurations. Area, 39(4), 458-469.
Batel, S., Devine-Wright, P., & Tangeland, T. (2013). Social acceptance of low carbon energy and associated infrastructures: A critical discussion. Energy Policy, 58, 1-5.
https://www.powerengineeringint.com/articles/2017/08/siemens-to-build-electric-highway-in-germany.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch? v=Z8l9ieoIazc#action=share
https://www.scania.com/group/en/worlds-first-electric-road-opens-in-sweden-2/
https://www.scania.com/group/en/electrification/
https://sandvikenpurepower.se/in-english/electric-highway.html
http://www.brebemi.it/site/?page_id=6487
https://www.deepdyve.com/lp/elsevier/the-non-linearity-of-risk-and-the-promotion-of-environmentally-PjD9bGqjZu?key=elsevier
https://www.deepdyve.com/lp/elsevier/sustainable-transport-analysis-frameworks-scYHS3cKC1?key=elsevier
https://www.deepdyve.com/lp/elsevier/sustainable-transport-ckrNRTR6c6?key=elsevier
https://www.ilsole24ore.com/art/impresa-e-territori/2018-09-07/brebemi-lancia-l-autostrada-elettrica-italia-siemens-e-scania-144048.shtml?uuid=AEgDjSmF
Experimenting for Sustainable Transport: the approach of Strategic niche management Remco Hoogma, René Kemp, Johan Schot, Bernhard Truffer 2002
http://calspa.it
https://www.ilsole24ore.com/art/impresa-e-territori/2018-09-07/brebemi-lancia-l-autostrada-elettrica-italia-siemens-e-scania-144048.shtml?uuid=AEgDjSmF
http://gds.it/2018/04/17/anfia-italia-solo-21-ma-nel-mondo-per-logistica-trasporti_836599/
http://ecopassenger.org/bin/query.exe/en?ld=uic-eco&L=vs_uic&OK#focus
https://www.forbes.com/sites/sebastianblanco/2017/11/08/electric-highway-california-siemens/#7cc073b974c6
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainability#Three_dimensions_of_sustainability
Siemens video:
Truck transportation depends on carbon fuel-> risks for human health and environmental
Provides relief and is also economical, open configuration structure
Flexibility: vehicle type, drive system, onoboard source of electricity, size of combustion engine and energy source for operation when non-connected to electric highways
Hybrid vehicles: a sensor checks whiter the traffic lane is equipped with a contact line, the truck automatically raises the pantograph (or the driver manually); the pantograph actively position itself to the overhead contact line, that is continually supplied with electric energy by the substations when connected; the pantograph transfer this energy to the electric motor and simultaneously it can charge the battery; the pantograph allows for flexible operation of the truck in all traffic situations: when overtaking or at the end of an eHighway, the pantograph lower itself into a safe position; existing roads can be upgraded with the highway infrastructure; when equipped, the roads remain accessible to all other road users
Zero emissions transports become possible, minimizing local emissions, significantly reducing CO2 and making transports more economical
Scania website:
23 June 2016 first 2 km
The new technology has been pioneered by Scania and Siemens, with the backing of various Swedish private and public sector bodies including the Swedish Transport Administration, Gävleborg Regional Authority, the Swedish Energy Agency Authority and Vinnova.
Sandvikenpurepower. Website
The major advantage of electric highways is of course that emissions disappear almost entirely. Additionally, both energy consumption and maintenance costs are significantly lower than with combustion engines. The efficiency of electric power is 77 per cent, which is high compared to a diesel engine, while energy consumption is about a fifth of diesel and petrol.
https://www.powerengineeringint.com/articles/2017/08/siemens-to-build-electric-highway-in-germany.html
Sustainable transport: analysis frameworks (Barbara C. Richardson, 2005)
Sustainable transport is the ability to meet today’s transportation needs without compromising the ability of future generation to meet their transport needs (Black, 1996)
The differences between passengers and freight framework derive mainly from the complex bundle of economic, temporal, psychological
If an individual invests money to improve the pollution control technology in his own vehicle, he incurs all the costs of that investment but reaps only a small percentage of the benefit… To address this problem, wide-scale intervention is needed. The intervention comes to the transportation system through government and industry initiatives.
Sustainable transport (David L Greene; Michael Wegener, 1997)
Policy fields:
• Transport technology
• Transport supply (is a way of enhancing economic growth)
• Transport demand (spatial division of labor)
Problem area 1: implementing technology for sustainable transport
There is no doubt that achieving an effective rate and direction I technological change is an essential ingredient to achieving sustainability.
Creating market incentives to develop new technologies
Problem area 2: pricing and financing of sustainable transport
Problem area 3: integrated transport and land-use planning for sustainable transport
Experimenting for Sustainable Transport: the approach of Strategic niche management Remco Hoogma, René Kemp, Johan Schot, Bernhard Truffer 2002
the technical fix ideology starts with the strong conviction that advances in transport technology will always – in the end – yield benefits that vastly outweigh the costs and that technology itself should never be the subject of policy debates. The only reason for policymakers to become involved in technology policy is because of market failures leading to underinvestment in research and development (R&D).
Proponents of the second, the cultural fix paradigm, view technology as part of the problem. The only way out is not to start with technology. Real solutions will have to come from social and cultural change.
there is not just one barrier to the introduction of alternative vehicles, but a whole range of factors that work against their adoption. These factors are interrelated, making a policy approach aimed at reducing individual barriers one by one less likely to succeed.
One important barrier to the introduction and use of new technology is that new technologies often do not fit well into existing transportation systems. The use of the new technology may require complementary technologies that are perhaps in short supply or expensive to use.
The manufacturers therefore remain uncertain about the market developments and will be reluctant to invest in risky alternatives.
Moreover, the existing regulatory framework may actually form a barrier to the development of new technologies.
Legislative flexibility to accommodate new technologies is often inadequate, partly because some of the actors may oppose the innovations in question.
For many automobile users, owning and driving a car is a way of expressing individual and societal identity: the car is a status symbol.
Alternative transportation technologies will convey different images and represent different values.
The new technologies have not yet proved their value, so consumers are not sure what to expect.
New technologies are often expensive due to the small absolute scale of manufacture and because they have not benefited from dynamic learning economies of production.8
There may be a chance to develop a new market, but the incentive for the automobile industry to introduce a product onto the market is not high when it is far from certain that the consumer is interested in buying it or when there are no external factors, such as legislation, compelling the manufacturers to act.
Electric vehicle batteries could cause additional waste problems; some alternative fuels lead to an increase of certain types of emissions; the growing of crops required for the production of bio-fuels requires large amounts of land, which are then not available for other purposes
good solutions from today’s point of view may preclude the development of better solutions in the future.
The traditional approach is to overcome the barriers through policies especially designed to deal with each one: information dissemination, the use of subsidies to reduce costs and stimulate demand; public investment in infrastructure; support for research to improve the technologies and reduce negative side-effects for the environment or human health.
Rather than a set of discrete barriers, we face a structure of interrelated factors that feed back upon one another, jointly giving rise to inertia in, and specific patterns of, technological change
The existence of patterns in technological change is widely recognized.
they noted that the problem-solving activities of engineers were not fine-tuned to changes in cost and demand conditions, but relatively stable, focused on particular problems and informed by certain notions of how these problems could be dealt with.
A technological paradigm consists of an exemplar (an artefact that is to be developed and improved) and a set of (search) heuristics, or engineering approaches, based on technicians’ ideas and beliefs of where to go, what problems to solve, and what sort of knowledge to draw on.
This interplay can be perceived as a co-evolutionary process of variation and selection, in which external selection pressures are anticipated by the innovator organization and incorporated into company R&D and production policies;
Society’s preference for the internal combustion engine thus depends not only on the prevailing interpretative framework of engineers, but also on the embeddedness of the combustion engine in engineering practices, production plants and organizational routines, and the embeddedness of automobiles with internal combustion engines in fuel distribution systems, travel and mobility patterns, and automobile repair and maintenance practices.
The definition of technological regime we use is:
the whole complex of scientific knowledge, engineering practices, production process technologies, product characteristics, skills and procedures, established user needs, regulatory requirements, institutions and infrastructures.15
the existing complex of a technology extended in social life imposes a grammar or logic for socio-technical change, the same way as the tax regime or the regulatory regime imposes a logic on economic activities and social behaviour.
There is also an incentive for outsiders to develop innovations that can be easily integrated into existing processes and products.
Both supply-side and demand-side changes are needed to introduce radically new technologies successfully. These changes consist of new ideas, production and user practices, the development of complementary assets and institutional change at the level of organizations and markets
Long periods of time. It often takes 50 years for a new technology system or regime to replace an old one.
2 Deep interrelations between technological progress and the social and managerial environment in which they are put to use. Radically new technologies give rise to specific managerial problems and new user- supplier-relationships; they require and lead to changes in the social fabric and often meet resistance from vested interests; moreover, they may give rise to public debates as to the efficacy and desirability of the new technology.
3 New technologies tend to involve ‘systems’ of related techniques; the economics of the processes thus depend on the costs of particular inputs and availability of complementary technologies. Technical change in such related areas may be of central importance to the viability of the new regime.
4 Perceptions and expectations of a new technology are of considerable importance. These include engineering ideas, management beliefs and expectations about the market potential, and, on the user side, perceptions of the technology. These beliefs and views of the new technology are highly subjective and will differ across communities. They are also in constant flux, and the progression of these ideas may be either a barrier or a catalyst to the development of a particular technology.
5 The importance of specialized applications in the early phase of technology development. In the early phase of a radically new technology there is usually little or no economic advantage of the technology; moreover, the existing technologies tend to improve during the development phase (the ‘sailing ship’ effect), rendering open market competition even more difficult.
The emergence of a new technological regime implies the simultaneous evolution of these changes. This simultaneous evolution is a co- evolutionary process: technological options, user preferences and needed institutional changes are not given ex-ante, but need to be created and shaped. Users, for example, do not have fixed demands that are fulfilled with a new technological option.
This required substantial technological development,
The first thing to observe is that gaslight emerged in the market niche of the textile industry. Due to distinct selection criteria in this niche, the textile industry was prepared to accept the disadvantages of gaslight
The alliance sheltered and developed the new technology. This was necessary, as the technology was still rather crude and not (yet) up to the demands of other potential markets.
From this first niche, a number of new niches developed, mainly for street lighting and public spaces. This process of niche branching includes the emergence of new application domains and the creation of a bandwagon effect (that is a wider diffusion) through replication of the niche elsewhere.
Developments branch off in different directions, cross- connections and interactions occur, and niches, that is limited and relatively easy or advantageous domains of application and further development, strongly determine what steps can be taken productively
Consumers’ demand developed; people learned to appreciate gas lighting and its intensity. This led to a new reference point for evaluating the traditional alternatives.
Not only consumers changed in the process; also cities learned gradually how to respond to new opportunities.
through a learning process, a new world, and a new technological regime emerged
Expectations play a crucial role in early phases of technical change.30 Technologies in the making have yet to prove themselves (in terms of technical, social as well as commercial viability). Parties that apply a new technology, therefore, often construct and communicate positive expectations in order to make actors (including themselves) believe that it will yield returns in the future, but they cannot be certain of these returns.
Second, we do not locate the innovative power in a single isolated entrepreneur, but suggest that network development and alignment work of actors is crucial to exploit niche opportunities.
Our hypothesis is that a regime-shift requires three types of coupled developments:
◆ Processes of niche developments of novelties followed by increasing returns of adoption;
◆ Erosion of opportunities to make progress within the regime; and
◆ Emergence of new external opportunities and constraints which challenge the problem solving capability of the existing regime. Such external development can be events (such as a war or a scientific breakthrough that allows for new technical developments) or broad trends such as urbanization.
First, the socio-technical landscape can be thought of as a set of connected technological and societal (hence socio- technical) trends, deep structures and major events that influence the opportunity structure for technologies embedded in regimes as well as new promising alternatives. These sets of factors are literally a landscape because they accommodate some developments more easily than others do. Second, the landscape is not influenced directly by the success of local innovation processes. So these factors influence the process but regime-shifts in specific sectors will not affect the landscape itself dramatically. Of course, if a number of regime-shifts occur, the landscape will be changed. For example, the emergence of electricity led to changes in factory regimes, transportation regimes, and household regimes and thus to a new kind of electrified society and economy. This is a special case of a pervasive technology.39
◆ Technical development and infrastructure: this includes learning about design specifications, required complementary technology and infra- structure;
◆ Development of user context: this includes learning about user characteristics, their requirements and the meanings they attach to a new technology and the barriers for use they encounter;
◆ Societal and environmental impact: this entails learning about safety, energy and environmental aspects of a new technology;
◆ Industrial development; this involves learning about the production and maintenance network needed to widen diffusion; and
◆ Government policy and regulatory framework: this involves learning about institutional structures and legislation, the government’s role in the introduction process, and possible incentives to be provided by governments to stimulate adoptions.
Introduction
“At its core, the issue of a clean environment is a matter of public health.”
– Gina McCarthy, Administrator for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
“The greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it.”
– Robert Swan, Author
Since the earliest civilization stages, “Sustainability” is core for the success or decline of a society: those who manage to create an equilibrium stable over time with the surrounding environment are more likely to flourish.
Since the end of the 20th century, many efforts are focused on reducing the human environmental impact, and, especially in the last few years, a lot of improvements are being made in the field of “Sustainable transport”: Sustainable transport is the ability to meet today’s transportation needs without compromising the ability of future generation to meet their transport needs (Black, 1996). The main goal is to significantly reduce the amount of CO2 emissions, by improving the infrastructures and exploiting alternative sources of energy. As a result, a lot of new technologies are now available and a lot more are yet to come; one of these is the Electric Highway (eHighway): the eHighway is a system of different technologies, put together in order to improve the sustainability of truck transportation. In particular: hybrid trucks (they can run both with a carbon fuel and an electric motor) are equipped with a pantograph; a sensor checks whether the traffic line is equipped with a contact line and the truck automatically raises the pantograph; the pantograph actively position itself to the overhead contact line, that is continually supplied with electric energy by the substations when connected; the pantograph transfer this energy to the electric motor and simultaneously it can charge the battery; the pantograph allows for flexible operation of the truck in all traffic situations: when overtaking or at the end of an eHighway, the pantograph lower itself into a safe position (video).
The first eHighway prototype was deployed in Sweden in 2016; the new technology has been pioneered by Scania and Siemens, with the backing of various Swedish private and public sector bodies including the Swedish Transport Administration, Gävleborg Regional Authority, the Swedish Energy Agency Authority and Vinnova (Scania website). A second prototype was implemented in Germany in 2017. The goal of the first prototypes is to test the environmental and economic impact of this new solution. According to siemens estimation, if 30% of German Highways are equipped with this new solution, it could lead to a saving of 6.000.000t of CO2 per year, with a 0 local emission of electric drive; on the economic side, 20.000€ of fuel can be saved on a German 40-ton truck running a distance of 100.000km, and up to 75.000€ savings on a Swedish 60-ton truck running a distance of 200.000km (Siemens, 2014).