The spatiotemporal fabric of energy flexibility: flexibility capital between regional energy transitions and national policy

Keywords: Energy, Political Ecology, Flexibility, Energy markets, European Union
Abstract Type: Paper Abstract

Abstract

Energy system flexibility advanced to become a priority on the political agenda in the European Union. In the eyes of policy makers and grid operators, a flexible electricity grid is key for achieving a low-carbon energy transition. Recent geographical scholarship begun to explore energy flexibility, but hitherto only explored some its socio-material dimensions. Since the systematic implementation of energy flexibility in the grid requires digital control mechanisms that decide about electrical distribution in real-time, flexibility creates a certain infrastructural materiality, which is a necessary requirement for entrenching the spatiotemporally of renewable energy into incumbent processes of capitalism. As such, this paper seeks to further dig out the materiality of flexibility in the German Energiewende on the Distribution System Operator (DSO) level. By analysing original interview data with engineers, policy experts and economists from the pioneering energy flexibility research projects in Germany, this paper will highlight how local flexibility markets (also called smart markets) are created as part of a wider commodification strategy of nature. Based on that it will argue that flexibility advances to become a new resource, whose exploitation generates new energy inequalities in the energy system. Inspired by the most recent writings on thermodynamics, materiality and infrastructure, this paper is therefore able to expand on the consequences of the electrification of everyday life. As such, it seeks to make a meaningful contribution to recent political ecology scholarship which seeks to understand how the future energy system is crafted between the poles of regional fragmentation and national ecological modernisation.