In this blogpost, Olga Coretcaia explains how her involvement in Energy-SHIFTS activities (Working Groups) have been critical to develop her PhD research.

As an early stage researcher within the Energy-SHIFTS project, I am a member of Working Group 1: Renewables. I have been involved in the analysis of almost 300 social sciences and humanities research (SSH) questions, which leading scholars in the field believe should be prioritised in future EU-funded research and innovation, specifically under Horizon Europe. I am also assisting in writing an academic paper based on this work, as well as Annotated Bibliography which aims to showcase the breadth of SSH insights on offer to policymakers.

When I joined the Energy-SHIFTS project, I was working with theories on the disruption of capitalism in societal transformation to sustainability within a research programme UNMAKING. My current research focuses on making practices in contemporary urban economies and their potential to facilitate sustainability transformation beyond capitalism. I am also a member of the Dutch Degrowth Platform Ontgroei, a recently established hub that aims to stimulate a societal shift towards a good life for all within planetary boundaries through training, lectures, publications, and other activities and events.

The transformative potential of renewable energy

The Energy-SHIFTS project offered me a unique opportunity to get insights into the key debates on renewable energy transition from the SSH perspective. Climate emergency and deepening inequality crises call for profound changes in the way we organize our systems of provision, such as energy, food, and material goods. All of these systems face structural constraints in the transformation towards sustainability that have not been always adequately addressed in academic and policy debates to this moment.

In this regard, it was inspiring to see the following research questions representing a significant part of about 300 collected inquiries: energy democracy, participatory governance, mission-oriented renewable energy businesses, degrowth and post-growth narratives, reduction of energy production and consumption, as well as the distribution of costs and benefits from the energy transition. They all lead to an overarching question on whether renewable energy can lead to a more fundamental transformation of society.

As an ESR, I am still learning how to ask relevant questions that can generate transformative insights for research, policy, and society in large. The Energy-SHIFTS project has undoubtfully helped me to expand my thinking, not least because of collaboration with bright senior scholars from Working Group 1. This experience will be highly valuable for the design and implementation of my PhD project which, I hope, will be able to reach the ‘policy front line’.

Olga Koretskaya is a PhD researcher at Erasmus University Rotterdam