Description
The circular economy discourse endorses sharing and efficient use of material assets. Whether for buildings, the car stock or the infrastructures such as the road network and the power grid, efficient provisioning requires the management of the timing of demand. In this paper, we propose that access rights can be conceptualised as ‘shifts consumption’ and explore the different techniques of allocating such rights. These include hard measures such as limited access to road infrastructure during rush hours, the market mechanisms of dynamic pricing ofe.g. electricity, and time-varying prices of services such as car sharing and the hospitality industry. In this paper, we review and develop a typology for demand management techniques and provide examples of how and with what effects they are being used. We also develop a critical lens towards a fair and inclusive transition to a circular economy from a perspective of daily rhythms. For pursuing circular economy and asset sharing, further understanding of who has access to prime-time consumption and what follows from being dislocated and pushed to
alternative rhythmic patterns is crucial. Circular economy literature is relatively underdeveloped regarding the broader social consequences of the extensive sharing of resources. In this paper, we follow the theory of social practices and complement the recent evolving study of flexibility capital (Powells and Fell 2019).
The notion of shift consumption conceptualizes the temporal aspects of fair transitions as a broad economy-wide phenomenon and points at valuable parallels between the study of the social consequences of shift work and the intensive sharing of consumption assets. References: Powells, G., & Fell, M. J. (2019). Flexibility capital and flexibility justice in smart energy systems.
Energy Research & Social Science, 54, 56-59.
| Period | 7 Jul 2023 |
|---|---|
| Event title | SCORAI-ERSCP-WUR Conference: Transforming consumption-production systems toward just and sustainable futures |
| Event type | Conference |
| Location | Wageningen, NetherlandsShow on map |
| Degree of Recognition | International |