GSI Seminar Series

Parallel worlds of the energy transition: African realities

By Dr Memory Reid

The global energy transition promises to decarbonise the planet. However, in the regions that supply its critical materials, such as the solar-rich coastlines of South Africa's Northern Cape and the lithium fields of Zimbabwe, what is the ecological reality on the ground? Are we, perhaps, trading one form of ecological harm for another, with the costs concentrated in ecologically sensitive and politically marginalised landscapes of the Global South, while the benefits accrue to energy consumers elsewhere?

Drawing on the socio-ecological systems framework and the emerging theoretical lens of multispecies justice, this talk presents two contrasting case studies from interconnected research projects: ENLENS (Energy Transition Through the Lens of SDGs) and The Emancipatory Potential of the Right to a Healthy Environment. These projects are undertaken in collaboration with Linda Musariri and Eileen Moyer at the Amsterdam Institute for Social Science Research, University of Amsterdam.

The talk argues that environmental science has a specific and urgent role in this moment: to document and critically engage the ecological consequences of the transition itself; to advocate for cumulative socio-ecological systems assessments that current EIA frameworks do not adequately capture; to integrate local ecological knowledge into transition infrastructure planning; and to operationalise multispecies justice as a governance framework, rather than treating it solely as a theoretical construct.