The document discusses the crucial role of the 'human factor' in the energy transition, emphasizing the importance of engaging citizens and local communities to mobilize knowledge and foster active participation in energy transformation. It critiques the preference for technological solutions over social engagement and calls for a shift towards bottom-up approaches in energy policies. The 'milesecure-2050' research aims to understand and overcome barriers to fossil fuel reduction and energy diversification, focusing on the long-term socio-economic impacts of energy transition strategies.

1. The crucial role of ”human factor"
in energy transition
Patrizia Lombardi*, POLITECNICO DI TORINO
* Personally speaking

3. Cities consume:
75% of natural resources
67-76% of energy
IPCC (2014) Climate Change 2014: Mitigation of Climate Change, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
UNEP (2012) Global Initiative for Resource Efficient Cities . United Nations Environmental Programme.

4. Cities produce:
>70% of global GDP
50% of waste
71-76% of energy-related
GHG
emissions
IPCC (2014) Climate Change 2014: Mitigation of Climate Change Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

5. 10-km-resolution map from: https://megacities.jpl.nasa.gov/
Distribution and intensity of fossil fuel
CO2 emission sources

6. CO2 emissions:
Old and new actors
2000 2050
USA & Canada 23% 12%
Enlarged EU 14% 8%
Russia & CIS 8% 5%
Japan 4% 2%
S-E Asia - China 20% 27%
South Asia - India 7% 13%
Africa 7% 15%
Latin America 7% 9%
Others 10% 9%
49%
51%
27%
73%
Source: EC, DG ENV/CLIMA

7.  Sustainability, security of supply and competitiveness are the
three complementary pillars of the European energy policy
(COM(2006)
 These three pillars have been translated into the main goals of the
more recent EU energy strategy (COM(2010). They have also been
re-confirmed in the EU's 2020 to 2030 transition framework for
climate and energy policies (COM(2014).
EU ENERGY POLICY
(EU MILESECURE-2050 WP1)

8. 1 Dependency
- From import (≈53% of PES)
- From fossil fuel (≈75% of energy need)
- Each member state acts differently
Issues identified in current energy trends
and policies
EU Member States’ Energy dependency (2011)
(EC, 2013)
Net energy self-sufficiency
(EU MILESECURE-2050 WP1)

9. 2 Consumption
• Still a major global consumer (13%) after Chine and USA.
• Economic sectors rely on different PES Multiple dependency
• Lifestyles and patterns of use societal changes
Issues identified in current energy
trends and policies
The EU Energy flow
(EC, 2013)
(EU MILESECURE-2050 WP1)

10. 3 Integration
- Harmonization of national policies with international ones
- Need for a real EU energy market
- Need for a greener energy mix and diversifying PES
Issues identified in current energy
trends and policies
Global energy-related CO2 emissions for IMACLIM –R (blue line),
REMIND-R (orange line) and WITCH (green line) (Source: Luderer et al.,
2012)

11. ENERGY ROADMAP 2050
The European Commission has developed a "Roadmap
for moving to a competitive low-carbon economy in
2050" (COM,2011)
Target of global climate
stabilization at 2°C
above pre-industrial
levels by the end of this
century, corresponding
to -80% GHG
reductions target in
2050 (100%=1990)
(Source: EC, December 2011)

13. (Derk Loorbach, 2014)
THE GREAT TRASFORMATION
the evolutionary revolution of modernization

14. Derk Loorbach, 2014
A NEW TRANSFORMATION
Socio economic revolution

15. DOE, Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) ”Trend
Data-Residential Buildings Sector” - 2008
huge growth of the total energy
consumed in the built
environment
the energy needed for every
built square meter is getting
lower and lower
Over the last decades we have had a strong improvement in the
energy efficiency of the built environment and at the same time
a huge growth of the total energy consumed
increasing of productive output
while using fewer resources
Eco-efficient approaches
(Lombardi & Trossero, 2013)

16. Transition toward Low Carbon Society?
• According to the European
Commission (DG CLIMA), "In a
low-carbon society we will live and
work in low-energy, low-emission
buildings with intelligent heating
and cooling systems. We will drive
electric and hybrid cars and live in
cleaner cities with less air pollution
and better public transport.”
NOTE: A societal system
supportying the LCS is essential
Over the past few years, Europe's energy system has been
encouraged to move towards a low-carbon, competitive and
secure energy system (COM, 2011)

17. LOW-CARBON
ENERGY SYSTEMCURRENT
SYSTEM
Secure
energy system
Socially
acceptable
energy system
Low carbon society has to be considered as a process
by nature that it is not the mere result of intentional
actions but the product of the interaction of multiple
intended and unintended elements (operational,
cognitive and pre-cognitive processes), all defining
complex “societal processes”
A SOCIETAL PROCESS
(EU MILESECURE-2050 project)

18. • MILESECURE-2050 aims to understand and overcome the
political, economic and behavioural trends that led Europe to
its difficulties in reducing fossil fuel consumption, and in
diversifying its energy balance at rates which guarantee
European energy security in the next years, reduce the
threat of climate change, and diminish the risk of an energy
gap in the coming decades.
• The 2050 timeframe is used to assess the legitimacy and efficacy of policies
in terms of the capacity for societies to transition to energy security and to
consider the long-term socio-economic impact of such options.

19. A Systemic perspective
(MILESECURE-2050 DoW, 2012)
MILESECURE-2050 has adopted a
combined perspective, which covers
the interactions and synergies
between societal processes, taking a
more holistic approach to
understanding societal change,
being influenced by multiple factors
MILESECURE-2050 has assumed a number of concepts from the
transition management theory, the path dependency theory,
post-normal science for developing a paradigm shift within a
society. It builds upon and expands existing approaches used to
understand and explain societal transitions, and demonstrates
how this new knowledge base can be applied to European policies

20. Bridging top down and botton up research, macro and
local levels
MILESECURE-2050, D.3.1

21. Learning lessons from Milesecure-2050
 Overall databases:
1500 anticipatory
experiences (AEs)
 Check: 440 AEs
 Deep Analysis: 90
AEs
 Different sectors
(energy production,
mobility, housing,
services and industry)
(MILESECURE-2050 WP2)
Caiati G. et al. (2014), “Report on
comparative analysis”, Milesecure 2050
Project, LSC

22. Anticipatory experiences
of energy transition
• Experiences incorporating the basic features of a more
complex transition to an environmentally sustainable
society and that anticipate the basic features of a broader
and more complex transition to environmentally
sustainable ways of producing, consuming, and distributing
energy
• Such experiences were understood as already existing
"parts” of a future post-carbon society allowing to focus
on concrete factual elements and not mere hypotheses

23. Examples of AEs
Energy Island, Samso Biogas from waste, Peccioli
Eva Lanxmeer, Culemborg City of cyclists, Copenhagen Superblocks, Vitoria-Gasteiz
(EU MILESECURE-2050 WP2)

24. • External governance and financial instruments (E) help
bottom-up initiatives scale to a regional or national level.
– Need to create governance environments and financial instruments to
spread local-scale best practices in energy transformation.
• Social, political movement and grassroots factors (S) is a
foundation for smooth energy transition.
– Policy action should focus on S. (Citizens’ orientation to change, engagement in
movements and projects at the local level, willingness to pay in part for initiatives)
• Behaviour change and transformation in the Personal
dimension (P) are prerequisites for the measurable success of
transition.
– Policies need to support paradigm change and new values rather than
technology development (MILESECURE-2050 WP3)

25. Relevance of E-S-P factors over time
(MILESECURE-2050 D3.1)

26. The rise of the human factor
• So far, policy-makers have preferred the technological driver,
relegating both the social and the individual dimensions to a
function of "acceptance" of this tactic.
– This tends to render the human factor as a mere receptor rather than
as an active agent for change.
• The Milesecure-2050 research revealed that policy-makers
may be ignoring the human factor in energy transition to the
detriment of rapid and significant change across Europe.
– This implies significantly less emphasis on technology and on top-down planning and
more emphasis on the enabling of both individuals and social groups to articulate
themselves and participate in the energy transformation.

27. Paradigm shift
27
Caiati G. and Pearson A., (2014)
(MILESECURE-2050

28. Scenario building
To explore different medium-to-long-term visions of the future
To enabling present-day decisions and mobilising joint actions
Backcasting scenarios
• Define a desiderable future and
than work backwards to identify
policies and programmes that will
connect the future to the present
Forecasting scenarios
• Trend projected at different time
horizons
• More descriptive, less normative
• Foresight scenarios support the
learning process by examining the
factors and trends that form
future developments

29. Scenario building exercise
Among all the qualitative information of
AEs and societal processes, two key
dimensions (plus one linked to the
geopolitical context) of the low carbon
transition will provide a structure for the
narratives of the scenarios
The IMACLIM-R model
(MILESECURE-2050 D4.1)
 Business-As-Usual
(BAU)
 Centralized Energy Transition
[top down policy vision]
(CENT)
 Social Energy Transition
[bottom up policy vision]
(SEnT)

30. Business-As-Usual
scenario
(BAU)
 A continuation of
“current state of
affairs”
No significant
change in people's
behaviors and
consumption styles,
no major changes in
technology,
economics, or
policies
No climate policies
 Mainly to assess
the costs of the
transition toward
a Low Carbon
Society
Centralized Energy
Transition scenario
(CENT)
 Climate policies =
Mitigation of GHG (CO2)
emissions
 Targets: Europe: -20%, -
40% and -80% respectively
in 2020, 2030 and 2050
/2005 (consistent with
Roadmap2050 and Frame
2030)
 Transition towards a LCS
occurs within:
 Centralised energy
production modes
 High fossil fuel
dependency
 No specific actions on
infrastructures
Social Energy
Transition scenario
(SEnT)
 Same climate objectives
(in terms of emissions
reductions)
 Deployment of AEs
Significant changes in
Consumption patterns
Energy production
modes (more
decentralized)
Location issues
(activities, housing…)
 Two ways of integration in
IMACLIM-R:
Transport module
Energy production
modes

31. SEnT – Ways of integration in IMACLIM-R
1- Transport module :
 A progressive reduction of households’
basic mobility (essentially commuting):
to represent a spatial reorganization at
the urban level (more dense cities) and
soft measures towards less mobility-
dependent conglomerations.
Change in Households’ preferences for
transportation modes (increase of soft
modes: biking, walking)
 Shifts in the modal structure of
investments in transportation
infrastructures favoring public modes
instead of private vehicles
 Reorganizations in
production/distribution process/logistics
allowing a decrease of freight
transportation needs
Dimension Technology
Nuclear
Renewables
Carbon Capture and Storage
Electric Vehicles
Energy Efficiency
Biofuels
Alternative liquid fuel supply Coal-to-liquids
Power generation decarbonization
Low Carbon end-use technologies
2- Energy production modes:
Much more optimistic scenario in terms of
low-carbon technologies (avaibility and
penetration):
(MILESECURE-2050 D4.1)

32. Preliminary results of the scenarios
Share of Energy expenditure in Housholds’s budget
(MILESECURE-2050 D4.1-4.3)
Energy import/Total imports
Energy import bill/GDP

33. coercition/enforcement
public debate
brokering
law
taxation
tendering
resolutions, MDGs
education/
information
incentives
political debate
action research
scientific advice,
consultancy
grassroot initiatives
communities
market creation
govt. reorg.
command&control
self regulation
advisory committees
subsidies
interest group funding
exhortation
inclusion/engagement
Regimes of governance
infrastructure
standards
innovation
open-source innovation
action research
technocracy/
socialengineering
democratic dream
(MILESECURE-2050 D5.1)

34. Conclusion
• Cities are a major driver of negative global
environmental change but have the capacity to
generate the potential solutions, given the social
innovation they can harness
• For energy transition to work well, it is indispensable to
engage citizens and local organizations so as to mobilize
local knowledge.
• Citizens, local communities are to be empowered:
– by enabling them to take care of their projects and of their
energy consamption and
– by including them in the governance cycle
• Governance of energy transition requires permanent
learning and revision of practices and tools.

35. Which direction?
UP DOWN?

36. "May you live in
interesting times”
(Chinese curse)
http://west-wight-sangha.blogspot.it/2010_05_01_archive.html

37. Thanks 4 Ur attention
Patrizia Lombardi
Coordinator of MILESECURE-2050
Head of Interuniversity Regional &Urban Studies and Planning
Politecnico di Torino
patrizia.lombardi@polito.it
MILESECURE-2050 has received support by the European Commission (FP7-SSH-2012-2- 320169)