Research summary
The climate emergency is the defining crisis of our time, and it has made divesting from fossil fuels a critically urgent issue. But the transition to a decarbonized economy will not succeed with technological innovations alone. The adoption of renewable energies and green technologies is often limited by economic and political factors, and a complete societal transformation is needed to address these questions.
Dr. Cynthia Morinville, Canada Research Chair in the Political Economy of Energy Transition, is studying the implications of how we extract, assign value to, and circulate the minerals and materials that are vital for alternative energy futures. She and her research team are using a political economy analysis to better understand the political and economic forces that can work together to hinder or hasten the transition to a decarbonized economy. By investigating the social and environmental dimensions of this transition, their research will inform scholarship and policy in support of effective, socially just green transitions.