-
Richter J. et al
1
STIR cities: Engaging energy systems design and planning in the
context of urban sociotechnical imaginaries
Authors:
Jennifer A. Richter, School for the Future of Innovation in
Society and the School of Social Transformation, Arizona State
University, Tempe, USA1
Abraham S.D. Tidwell, School for the Future of Innovation in
Society, Arizona State University, Tempe, USA2
Erik Fisher, School for the Future of Innovation in Society,
Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona, USA3
Thaddeus R. Miller, Urban Studies and Planning, Portland State
University, Portland, USA4
Abstract: Since the first electrification systems were
established in the United States between 1910 and 1930, energy
systems governance at the municipal level has included competing
visions for how engineering design and energy policymaking should
foster particular social outcomes. Using Phoenix as a
representative metropolitan area, and the cases of distributed
generation and in-home power management devices as examples, this
paper explores how the norms and values embedded in energy systems
design and planning shape how residents experience change in the
energy grid. Through these case studies, the authors argue that
such “sociotechnical imaginaries” – collectively formed visions of
social life related to science and technology development – are a
crucial, yet overlooked, pathway for social science to engage in
fostering socially reflexive mechanisms in energy development. To
conclude, the authors outline a research program for applying
socio-technical integration research (STIR) to developing socially
reflexive capacities in municipal energy producing, regulating, and
planning institutions. Such a program has the ability to produce a
deeper intellectual understanding of how energy development occurs,
and in doing so generate new pathways for fostering cultural and
material changes in the structure of contemporary energy
systems.
The Phoenix metro area is located in an arid region of the
American Southwest created by the
Rio Salado (Salt River) basin that covers almost 2000 square
miles. Phoenix is the largest city in
the region, and the seat of Maricopa County, with a metropolitan
population that exponentially
increased from 331,770 in 1950 to 4,009,000 in 2015 (Theobald
2015). This incredible
population surge was enabled by a political system that
privileged the business and land-owning
elite that dominated Arizona politics after World War II, and
who were heavily focused on
increasing economic growth by luring wealthy retirees and
military-industrial complex
1 Corresponding author: Jennifer Richter.
Address: PO Box 875603, Tempe, AZ 85287. Phone: 480-965-7682.
Email: [email protected]
2 Address: PO Box 875603, Tempe, AZ 85287. Phone:
540-303-2579. Email: [email protected] 3 Address:
PO Box 875603, Tempe, AZ 85287. Phone: 480-286-8767. Email:
[email protected] 4 Address: PO Box 751-CUS,
Portland, OR 97207. Phone: 503-725-4016. Email:
[email protected]
-
Richter J. et al
2
corporations such as Motorola and General Dynamics (Needham
2014). Their values and beliefs
shaped the growth of human activity in Phoenix, and the
subsequent energy systems they created
and supported, were instrumental to the economic activity that
has supported the area. The
culture of Phoenix as a place and as a destination was
established during this time as a desert
imaginary- a place where the new innovations and leisure of the
modern age could
simultaneously emerge, reclaiming the vast, “empty” and
inhospitable wasteland of the Sonoran
desert, transforming it into a productive and politically
important region of the United States.
However, future growth is now dependent on aging energy and
water systems, typified
by the Roosevelt Dam originally completed in 1911 to hold water
from the Salt River for
agricultural irrigation, and the Glen Canyon Dam built in the
1950’s to provide energy to move
water to the Phoenix area, 200 miles south. Adjacent to Glen
Canyon is the Navajo Generating
Station, a coal-fire power plant built in the 1980’s on Navajo
Nation land in the Four Corners
area, also meant to feed the energy and water needs of the
growing Phoenix metropolitan area.
These mega projects rerouted rivers, created enormous artificial
aquifers and established a
pattern of energy production that took energy from far-away
places and transmitted it to the
metro area (Needham 2014).
These water and energy systems, and how they configure the lives
of residents of
Phoenix today, are neither accidental nor a “natural” outcome of
market activities. They are the
products of particular visions – or “sociotechnical imaginaries”
– of how science and technology
should shape the orderly and beneficial development of society,
visions that articulated endless
economic growth based the ideas of American exceptionalism from
the 1700’s stemming from
bountiful natural resources (Smith and Marx 1994). This paper
seeks to untangle two aspects of
energy transitions in the American West: First, this paper
describes how energy patterns in the
region were established, using the Phoenix metro area as an
exemplar of how these energy
systems led to the establishment of a 4.5 million person city in
a region with only 10 inches of
rainfall per year. It is crucial to have a deeper understanding
of the imaginaries that drove,
shaped, and led to the implementation of and commitment to this
system, in order to understand
current controversies over how those energy systems should and
must change to meet
contemporary understandings of the ecological limitations of the
region.
Second, this paper will examine two case studies that illustrate
competing energy values
and goals for the Phoenix area. These cases are not unique to
the city, but are representative of
-
Richter J. et al
3
battles underway throughout the United States over what kinds of
values will shape and drive the
next energy transition from fossil fuels to renewables. Using
the examples of distributed
generation of solar energy, and user-based systems of
self-metering, we demonstrate how these
are also intensely regional, local, and individual issues,
reflecting diverse value systems from
diverse stakeholders. It is critical to understand these
approaches in order to comprehend why a
shift to more flexible, less centralized energy systems is a
controversial topic in the US.
Furthermore, these cases are reflective not only of the
infrastructural constraints posed by the
design and operation of the current electrification grid, but
also the importance of understanding
the imaginaries that underlie energy systems development, in
order to develop methodologies
that can heighten awareness of these imaginaries in order to
productively engage with their
influence over design, policy, and operation.
To address this final point, we will introduce a method for
engaging with energy system
designers and planners. This approach, called Socio-Technical
Integration Research (STIR) has
been used in laboratory settings in order to expand, change, or
redirect research towards
incorporating larger social value considerations as they emerge
(Fisher and Schuurbiers, 2013;
Flipse et al., 2013; Schuurbiers, 2011; Stilgoe et al. 2013).
Our version, which we have dubbed
STIR Cities, is a more comprehensive approach to understanding
how a large sociotechnical
system like energy production and distribution that drives the
urban centers and agricultural
systems of the American West is the product of specific goals
and values by planners and
practitioners (STIR Cities Project Description). Today,
different values are at play in Phoenix,
and we are witnessing a complex and unruly transition from
fossil fuel-based energy sources to
potentially more renewable and sustainable forms of energy that
may lead to more resilient
communities, but will certainly change the relationship between
energy consumer, energy
producer, and the urban public institutions such as planning
offices and universities engaged in
the transformation of Phoenix. This is especially important for
the American Southwest, which
was “discovered” by European explorers and settlers during an
unusually wet period for the
Southwest (Steinberg, 2009). Today, the West has reverted to a
more arid state, and the forecast
for the next century due to changing climate patterns is for
much more intense periods of aridity
punctured by intense weather events that will strain these aging
energy systems, even as
populations continue to grow (Ye and Grimm 2013, Cayan et al
2010, Reisner 1986). Therefore,
STIR Cities can be a useful tool for understanding the scope and
influence of different
-
Richter J. et al
4
viewpoints, and then integrating those concerns before
technologies, systems, procedures—and
the expert performances that produce and reproduce them—are
fully designed and implemented
on larger scales. In doing so, our paper answers the call by
scholars of the social dimensions of
energy systems to recognize (1) the contingent nature of our
current energy systems, and (2) to
direct energy systems scholarship towards explicating the values
and assumptions that underlie
these large technoscientific projects (Miller, Richter, &
O’Leary 2015; Sovacool and Brown
2015). If energy systems are, as these scholars argue, always in
a process of making and
unmaking, engaging directly with those parties who have
articulated the visions of paradise in
the desert that underlie Phoenix has the potential to catalyze
the kind of reflective thinking that
could transform energy systems design and planning, as well as
the energy systems themselves.
Energy systems and sociotechnical imaginaries in the United
States
Energy is, as the physicist Richard Feynman remarked once, a
“very subtle concept” (Feynman
2011[1969]). As a scientific concept, it exists in a
socially-inflected space where, at least since
the late 19th century, it has informed everything from patterns
of industrial operations to daily
human behavior (Rabinbach 1991; Smith 1998). Yet it is more than
a social concept, for patterns
of energy production and consumption are “realized through
artefacts and infrastructures that
constitute and that are in turn woven into bundles and complexes
of social practice” (Shove and
Walker 2014, 42; Laird 2013). Human societies materialize
energy, and in doing so, articulate
the kinds of worlds they imagine are necessary and “good” for
the polity writ large.
The history of energy in the United States demonstrates this
point – the rise of coal as a
major source of energy for Americans required the construction
of a multitude of technologies
and new ways of conceptualizing what “consuming” energy looked
like. Christopher Jones’
(2015) study of energy infrastructures in the mid-Atlantic
region shows that anthracite, the hard
coal synonymous with Pennsylvanian coal production, only rose in
prominence through the co-
production of systems of moving resources and a population that
saw coal as the qualitatively
and quantitatively “better” source of heating. Similarly, other
studies of electrification in the 20th
century emphasize that at the outset of electrification,
shifting energy production and
consumption patterns on a larger scale would require enrolling
the populace in a process of
imagining different forms of life and livelihood, facilitated by
new energy sources (Hughes,
-
Richter J. et al
5
1982; Nye 1990). This is true not only of the Eastern part of
the US, but also in the West, where
the Colorado Plateau became a central nexus of energy production
due to its expansive coal
mines, and subsequent construction of coal-fire power plants
such as the Navajo, Mojave, and
Four Corners Generation Stations that were constructed after
WWII (Needham 2014).
These processes were neither inclusive nor universally positive
– like all other technological
systems, energy systems are politics by infrastructural means,
and choices of design are equally
choices of who can participate in a new energy system, where
capital will flow and, importantly
for justice considerations, who will receive the energy produced
and who will bear the negative
effects of energy production (see Mitchell 2011). Much of this
energy infrastructure work
continues to occur within the hands of a few small groups in
societies: utility engineers and
managers, regulatory bodies, city planners, and energy
technology corporations. Energy systems
design has, and continues to be, a process of these groups
(amongst others) articulating
“collectively imagined forms of social life and order” (Jasanoff
and Kim 2009, 120), or
“sociotechnical imaginaries” as to what the grid should do and,
importantly, how energy
producer and energy consumer are networked together. These
imaginaries inflect planning and
design choices, choices that are materialized in systems and, in
the case of Phoenix, are coded as
necessary for large-scale human habitation of the northern
Sonoran. Sociotechnical imaginaries
bring to bear an element much of the larger body of research on
energy and society have failed to
do – the “integrated material, moral, and social landscapes”
(Jasanoff and Kim 2015, emphasis
added) that underlie how these aforementioned experts
materialize our “energetic” world.1
The ideal American lifestyle of the mid-20th century, depicted
through the objects of an
electrified and energetic culture, was built on this cultural
history of electrification and
transformation of the home, community, and region writ large
(Cowan 1983). However, in an
America suffused with discourses of economic security, national
security, security of the free
world, and security of the home, energy development and the
productivity of the American
people through energy became a moral necessity of national
development (Tidwell and Smith
2015). The Southwestern U.S. exemplifies this pattern, where the
ideal of a converting a desert
“wasteland” into a productive and useful part of the nation
fueled the drive to divert water to
agricultural purposes and eventually for energy as well (Reisner
1986, Wilshire, Nielson and
Hazlett 2008). By the 1950’s, military installations and the
post-WWII baby boom, coupled with
-
Richter J. et al
6
cheap housing and cheaper electricity provided by the dams and
coal plants of the West, the
American Southwest was one of the fastest growing areas of the
nation.
These energy systems were, and still in many ways are,
predicated on a pattern typified
by the displacement of environmental burdens related to energy
production on to marginalized
communities in order to supply urban centers with plentiful
energy and water. This was an
approach developed in an era (1940’s- 1960’s) that took
advantage of lax environmental
regulations, little local opposition, low population density,
racially prejudiced land policies, and
arid geographies to convert lands that were characterized as
empty, desolate, and useless into
productive resources (Needham 2014; Kuletz 1998). For instance,
the above-mentioned energy
plants place a disproportionate burden of air and water
pollution on members of the Navajo
Nation living near these plants, even as they provide an
economic engine for some members of
the Navajo community (Needham 2010, Necefer et al 2015), though
only about 30% of residents
on the Navajo Nation have access to electricity (Landry 2015).
Yet, as we have outlined earlier,
not all of these elements of those visions of the future that
underlie Phoenix’s development
continue to play a direct role. Understanding how to address the
intersections between what
imaginaries built the electrification grid Phoenicians inhabit,
and those currently driving the
development of grid transformations, requires first grounding
these larger histories within the
context of material systems that residents encounter on a daily
basis.
The following case studies illustrate two examples of the
variety of energy system
technologies and controversies encountered in Phoenix today.
They are sites of contestation over
not only the future of energy in the West, but also over what
ideologies and values will drive
future energy transitions, including what kinds of sources will
be used to produce energy in the
future, how centralized or dispersed energy production and
consumption will be, and who will
control energy production and how it will be used. These
examples show the complexity of
energy systems, and the different values embedded in those
systems. By tracing the values
expressed in these systems, including who the major drivers are
and how they articulate specific
ideas related to energy-based sociotechnical imaginaries, it
becomes clear that struggles over
energy system transformation in the Phoenix metro area are not
only about electricity, but also
about making the future of electricity production in the Valley
mesh with the social, political,
and cultural values of different kinds of producers and
consumers. These examples are
necessarily intertwined and overlapping, and provide insight
into the ways that the norms of
-
Richter J. et al
7
growth and modernity through electrification,
municipality-utility relations, infrastructural lock-
in, and the desert landscape itself order the ways in which
Phoenicians design, encounter, and
interact with energy in the “Valley of the Sun.”
Utilities and energy production: Arizona Public Service, Salt
River Project, and distributed
generation in Phoenix
The two major utilities in Phoenix are Salt River Project (SRP)
and Arizona Public Service
(APS). While they are both major providers of electricity and
leaders in solar energy
development, their historical models are vastly different and
reflect back on how they currently
engage with consumers and the various municipal and state level
agencies engaged in energy
development. Early residents of modern Phoenix developed a
series of ditches and canals,
partially drawing on those still visibly left by the Hohokam
people during the 1100’s, but mostly
constructing their own, to irrigate crop fields, provide water
for the townspeople, and partially to
provide rudimentary sewage (Ross 2011). These canals,
rudimentary at best, were supplemented
by a series of wells throughout the city, the majority of which
were in private hands until the 20th
century. The Salt River Valley Water Users Association (SRVWUA),
the first segment of SRP’s
business, stems from a similar response by landowners on the
eastern edge of the valley to
develop the reservoirs necessary to sustain year round
agriculture. Funded through the National
Reclamation Act of 1902, the Roosevelt Dam would begin a series
of events marking the
longstanding relationship between municipal Phoenix as a water
purchaser and the SRVWUA as
a key provider (Kupel 2003, 80). As an organization, it was
ostensibly owned by the landowners
it served, but due to the land-ownership centric structure of
the leadership election system (a vote
per acre), was dominated by a handful of large landowners in the
east valley. The SRVWUA at
this stage was not a power provider; Phoenix had relied, since
prior to incorporation, on a
municipal provider of electricity and fuels, including the power
produced from the initial
hydroelectric generators installed on Roosevelt Dam, the Central
Arizona Light and Power
Company (CALAPCO). By the 1920s both companies were building
competing grids in the
valley; under arrangement the two companies agreed to split the
valley – with CALAPCO taking
downtown Phoenix and the north and west valleys and SRVWUA most
of Tempe and all of the
south and east valleys (Needham 2014, 39).
-
Richter J. et al
8
By 1936, the State of Arizona restructured the legal boundaries
of agricultural projects
like the SRVWUA, and a second company – the second half of
today’s SRP – the Salt River
Project Agricultural Improvement and Power District was formed
(SRP 2015a; ibid). Today
these two divisions operate as a seamless single organization,
SRP. CALAPCO would go
through a number of mergers and acquisitions before emerging in
the 1950s as Arizona Public
Service. SRP’s status as a state-owned utility and part of the
State of Arizona means that unlike
APS (which is a publically traded company) it has no
responsibility to adhere to the rulings of
the state’s utility regulatory board, the Arizona Corporation
Commission (ACC). However, it is
generally understood by energy professionals in the valley that
SRP will, unless mandated to do
otherwise by the state legislature (to which it is directly
responsible), follow the rulings of the
ACC. This byzantine set of relationship between SRP, APS, ACC
and the state legislature are
crucial for framing the relations of energy systems
technologist, business professionals, and
policymakers that underlie the current controversies over
distributed generation.
Controversies over net metering are an instructive and
illuminating example of a complex
sociotechnical system relating to solar energy, illustrating the
gulf between public
understandings of energy production and those of utilities. For
the members of the public, net
metering (NEM) policies—which credit solar energy system owners
for the electricity they send
back to the grid—offered by APS were an attractive incentive for
investing personal funds into
solar photovoltaic (PV) units. While several versions of an NEM
policy had been in play since
1993, the current version was passed in 2008 and has been
controversial. Distributed generation
PV systems also became more popular due to favorable credits
offered by the federal
government, which offered a 30% tax credit for renewable energy
systems and efficiency
measures on private residences passed as part of the American
Recovery and Reinvestment Act
of 2009. The ACC also passed a renewable portfolio standard
(RPS) in 2006, which set a state
standard that 15% of energy produced in the state must come from
renewable resources by 2025,
with 15% of that energy coming from renewable energy credits
(REC), and 30% provided by
distributed generation, and half of that distributed generation
from residential solar units (SEIA
2013).
Both SRP and APS have struggled with containing the effects of
increased numbers of
customers who were promised net metering when they installed
distributed generation units on
their residences. In 2013, APS, sought permission from the ACC
to cancel the NEM program
-
Richter J. et al
9
that had led to spike in distributed generation (DG), or rooftop
solar, installations over the
previous decade. APS argued that the increase in solar customers
had led to a “cost shift” from
DG customers to non-solar customers. Without an increase in fees
to solar customers to offset
their net metering, APS argued that non-solar customers would
have to shoulder more of the
costs of grid maintenance. In order to eliminate this cost
shift, the average bill for a solar
customer would therefore increase an average of $50-100 per
month, negating the economic
advantage of installing a rooftop solar system. In 2013, APS
requested that the ACC allow APS
to impose a fee on solar customers, in addition to eliminating
net metering. During this time,
APS provided money to an anti-solar non-profit group that
produced and ran television
commercials that portrayed solar customers as exploiting the
grid to their own benefit and at the
expense of other non-solar customers (Trabish 2013). APS, along
with its parent company
Pinnacle West, also lobbied heavily for two anti-solar
candidates for the ACC, leading to
accusations of collusion between the ACC and APS and questions
of whether a regulated
monopoly should be funding the campaigns of candidates for the
board that is meant to regulate
them (Purcell, Chediak, and Newkirk 2015). The ACC agreed to a
$0.70/kW fee, which
averaged to about $5 per customer per month (Energy Policy
Innovation Council (EPIC) 2013).
But the ACC did not allow for APS’ original request that would
have amounted to about $50 per
solar customer. SRP is in a similar situation, though it is not
regulated by the ACC, which
allowed the utility to pass its own rate increase for
distributed generation customers in 2015,
raising their rates to about $50-$100 monthly per solar customer
(Randazzo 2015a). Also in
2015, the ACC is reviewing the case for a rate increase for APS’
solar customers again, causing
more uncertainty and doubt regarding the future of distributed
roof top generation in Arizona.
Public groups, such as Tell Utilities Solar Won’t Be Killed
(TUSK) and Chispa, a pro-solar
group that focused on access to solar energy for Hispanics in
Phoenix, as well as hundreds of
solar customers who attended public meetings held by APS and SRP
to protest these rate
changes, argue that DG requires a substantial investment by
residential customers, the energy
produced is distributed to other customers, and they have the
right to produce energy
independently and individually. In other words, in their view,
utilities do not have to be the sole
distributers of electricity in the Valley, and energy is
inherently an issue of justice in terms of
distribution, not merely one of economics or technological
systems. In these scenarios, DG is a
site of contestation over the social as well as the economic
value of solar energy.
-
Richter J. et al
10
Controversies over NEM exemplify shifting roles for both
utilities and consumers of
electricity. The crux of these issues is how to accurately and
legitimately account for different
ways of valuing energy. DG customers no longer see themselves
solely as consumers, but rather
as producers of energy. As such, utilities can take advantage of
the electricity produced by DG
systems to supplant electricity that would have come from
another natural gas or coal plant,
negating the need to construct more centralized plants. Another
issue with NEM rate changes is
that the method that utilities use to value DG solar is limited
to narrow economic measures that
are based on the centralized role of utilities in producing
energy. While this is true today, in the
future, the production of energy may become less centralized due
to DG. Solar installations
companies and DG producers are challenging the utilities’ narrow
valuation of DG, arguing that
the benefits of DG are being ignored because they don’t mesh
with the traditional production
cycle of utility-distributed energy. Meanwhile, utilities are
trying to incorporate solar generation
in a manner that works with the existing grid in a predictable
manner that is reliable. As Frank
Laird has noted, “Energy policy advocates are motivated by the
meanings they attach to the
technologies they advocate” (2001: 5) and in these scenarios,
energy can be seen as an inherently
sociotechnical system. Incorporating a plurality of values into
this system is a key component of
recognizing the social aspects of energy production. How that
will be done in a fair and
equitable manner that recognizes new energy systems and
components, as well as new
consumers and producers, is a central energy challenge Arizona
is facing today.
Salt River Project’s M-Power®: In-home device energy monitoring
technologies
A perpetual challenge utilities face in daily business
operations is dealing with customers who
fail to pay their bills. These arrears become both a burden for
the utility, sometimes mounting
into the millions of dollars. Should a utility not be able to
address the cost, it may seek to transfer
this cost to its wider customer base. SRP, as a quasi-state
owned utility, is in a particularly
challenging position here, as it exists neither as a clearly
identified “private” enterprise (such as
APS), nor as a trust of the entire state’s populace (due to the
voting system under which it
operates). At a macro-level, this conundrum pertains to the role
of these semi-monopolistic
enterprises in a democratic (and ostensibly liberal economic)
society. From the perspective of
sociotechnical imaginaries, however, attempts to answer such
questions should be grounded in
-
Richter J. et al
11
institutionalized understandings of the common good and the
local performances of these
understandings on the part of expert organizations and
practitioners. Rather than starting with
normative questions such as what energy policies and
technological designs are best, we seek to
understand how such questions are already being answered by the
institutional arrangements and
expert performances; how has SRP, for example, designed
electrical distribution and
consumption systems, and what do these systems say about how SRP
sees its role as a policy-
through-technology making agent in the valley. M-Power®, SRP’s
pay-as-you-go billing
program, provides a constructive window through which to explore
these questions of energy
systems design and society. M-Power® was one of the earliest
attempts by a major utility to alter
the producer-consumer relationship from one of monthly bills and
utility readers to a system
where, as they claim, the consumer is now empowered to control
their electricity consumption
(Salt River Project 2013).
In 1993, the Arizona Legislature mandated that SRP develop a
system for assisting low-
income households with lowering energy consumption and meeting
payments (Neenan and
Robinson 2010). The system they devised was a pay-as-you-go
process, coupling a specifically
designed meter and user display terminal (UDT). M-Power® is not
“smart” in the sense that it
facilitates a two way process of communications between the
utility and the consumer – rather,
the meter transmits consumption information to the UDT which
then accounts for the cost of
power based on the time of year (M-Power® uses a two-tiered flat
rate system) and deducts it
from the money uploaded to the UDT. Money is added to the UDT
via a “smart card” – these
cards must be taken to a SRP pay station (located in grocery
stores, gas stations, and SRP
offices) and loaded with money (via check or cash) beforehand.
Since the inception of this
program, the M-Power® system has expanded from 100 low-income
homes to being available
throughout the SRP service area. SRP argues that such systems
offer a lower upfront cost
alternative for customers, allow those who cannot pay a large
lump sum at the end of the month
to continue paying their bills as money becomes available, and
helps customers understand their
energy consumption patterns.
Despite these purported advantages, and the high customer
satisfaction numbers SRP
reports, a number of systemic sociotechnical patterns remain
attached to M-Power®. First
amongst these is the claim made that M-Power® targets low-income
customers. Regardless of
the intentioned actions of SRP, the design of the system has
produced outcomes where, as
-
Richter J. et al
12
reported in the Electric Power Research Institutes’ 2010 report,
the majority of customers make
less than $30,000 a year and are predominantly Hispanic and
African American (Neenan and
Robinson 2010, 4-6). A second pattern pertains to the movement
of knowledge of energy
consumption between the consumer and producer. With the larger
push amongst technologists
and policymakers towards the transformation of current
electrical grids into highly responsive,
multi-directional communication systems (the “smart grid”), SRP
has presented M-Power® as a
demand-side response tool. It is important to distinguish the
concept of “demand-side response”
from the cost-cutting measures the Arizona legislature outlined
in 1993; “demand-side response”
indicates a system of clear knowledge transfer between the
utility and the consumer of how
much electricity they are using and, importantly, in such a way
that it enables the consumer to
respond accordingly. The Arizona Community Action Association
has argued this rhetorical
presentation of M-Power® as enabling conservation, arguing that
for low-income residents
conserving electricity is not a salient issue given their
capital constraints (Howat and
McLaughlin 2012, 10).2 A quick overview of how the UDT presents
information to users appears
to add some credence to this claim; the meter provides basic
information pertaining to energy
consumption for the current day and month (in kWh), how much
money from the pre-payment is
left, and how much money has been spent during the current day
(Salt River Project 2013b). For
comparison, a SRP smart meter customer can access, via their
MyAccount internet-based bill
payment system, daily consumption patterns and longer-term (days
to months) trends in their
consumption; an M-Power® customer would have to manually record
and graph this information
to acquire the same knowledge (Salt River Project 2014a).
A final pattern is the purposeful design of meters that, should
money run out, are
designed to shut off power to a home. These features, meant to
limit arrears generated from
households where bills are no longer being paid, do not simply
turn off power at any time;
“Friendly Credit” periods exist in the evenings and on weekends
when it may not be possible for
customers to gather the money or transportation necessary to
reach a SRP Pay Station (Salt River
Project 2014b). Consumer advocacy groups have spoken out against
such design features,
arguing they unfairly target the poor, the elderly, and families
with children (NCLC report), and
SRP has developed exceptions for some of these groups, though
at-risk group customers are not
mandated to opt out (Howat and McLaughlin 2012).3 While such
exceptions may address
programmatic concerns, such social groups pose broader
challenges to SRP that require technical
-
Richter J. et al
13
expertise to respond to public values, as evident in the
following response from SRP’s former
customer service manager (Association for Demand Response &
Smart Grid 2012, 9):
“There is a belief out there that the utility is the last
bastion of easy credit for low-income customers and that we should
do everything we can to keep the power on” says Mike Lowe. “We have
done a number of things to help with that. If you get disconnected,
you have the option to go on prepay and pay off your arrearage over
time.”
Constructed in this fashion, SRP seeks to operate like any other
private enterprise and must
design its policies to protect its bottom line—despite playing a
major role in constituting the
metropolis of Phoenix (certainly the city would not exist as it
does today); at the same time, as a
state subsidiary, it is obligated to be responsive to the
political imaginaries that constitute the
state of Arizona.
These three patterns of design—one pertaining to the
relationship between the M-
Power® system uptake and consumer identity, the second outlining
the patterns of knowledge of
electricity consumption uptake, and finally the temporal and
capital dynamics of a pay-as-you-go
design—elucidate the power of infrastructural systems to pattern
lived experience (Edwards
2004). This should not be taken as a critique of intention –
infrastructural sociotechnical systems
such as the electrical grid are built with a variety of norms
and values embedded within them and
exhibited through the execution of technological design. Yet
they reflect, in many ways, the
ambiguous relationship between the Phoenix polity and the
institutions they ostensibly have
input in operating. Exploring cases such as M-Power® and
distributed generation, how Phoenix
energy systems design relates to these underlying sociotechnical
imaginaries of transforming the
desert through power, and how current “smart grid” developments
inflect design and policy
choices (Slayton 2013), is a crucial step towards asking the
larger question of what kind of
energy systems do we want in our urban environments and the
American Southwest writ large.
STIR Cities seeks, through the recognition of such patterns of
human behavior linked to
technological design of grids, to engage productively in the
design process through facilitating
the identification and reflection on these norms and values.
More concretely, insofar as patterns
such as these point to the ways in which formal and technical
systems are informed by
understandings of the common good, they represent for STIR
Cities potential sites of social
-
Richter J. et al
14
scientific engagement with civic, expert and organizational
performances of sociotechnical
imaginaries.
Transforming energy systems through socio-technical integrative
research
Socio-technical Integrative Research (STIR) provides a method
for technical experts such as
energy system designers and engineers to consciously recognize
how their values, ideas, and
interpretations become embedded in the technologies and systems
that shape our collective lives
(Schuurbiers and Fisher, 2009: Fisher and Schuurbiers, 2013).
The larger body of socio-technical
integration research emphasizes the potentially expansive and
responsive relations of experts and
their technical practices to the larger social and cultural
context(s) in which they reside. STIR
accounts for the boundary dynamics between experts (hitherto,
primarily laboratory research
scientists) and how such societal divides are constructed; its
methods emphasize “close
proximity” and engagement with immediate activities in order to
document and understand the
possibility and utility of “practical transformation” in the
everyday practices of such experts vis-
à-vis their social context(s) (Fisher et al. 2015, 41-2). STIR
builds on the larger body of
laboratory studies, studies of expertise in the field of Science
and Technology Studies (STS), the
policy sciences, and John Dewey’s theory of inquiry in an effort
to “inform institutional design
aimed at increased responsiveness of expert practices to broader
sets of social values by
specifying the conditions that enable and constrain such
responsiveness” (STIR Cities Project
Description). Previous STIR studies have accomplished this
through collaborative description
and inquiry between research scientists and “embedded
humanists.” The latter employ a decision
protocol in order to open up reflection and deliberation within
the discursive and material spaces
of laboratory practices (Fisher 2007). The results of
collaborative inquiry are analyzed using a
framework for “midstream modulation,” which pertains to the
modification of ongoing research
and development processes by means of fostering greater
reflexivity towards societal contexts,
and in doing so fostering reflexive and responsible innovation
(Fisher, Mahajan, and Mitcham
2006, 492; Owen Macnaghten and Stilgoe 2012).
The context of large-scale energy systems development, however,
will require several
adaptations to STIR methodology. As other STS researchers have
pointed out, outcomes for
enhancing reflexivity amongst technical experts depend on (1)
identifying and justifying sites as
-
Richter J. et al
15
the appropriate locations for fostering change in the larger
network of activities (in this case,
urban energy development), and (2) a recognition of where these
sites sit within the larger forces
at play (e.g., national energy development, urban non-energy
related development) (Wynne
2011). STIR Cities will explicitly capture these questions, both
in terms of how the study will be
carried out and in terms of how we will modify current STIR
protocols and practices to account
for the alternative knowledge systems that underlie the
production of smart grid technologies,
policies, and practices. STIR Cities consists of a three-year,
two city, multi-site study that seeks
to answer the following questions:
(1) How and why are smart energy systems being developed and
deployed in urban centers? (Year One)
(2) How are they imagined to meet and create desirable forms of
social and technological order? (Years One and Two)
(3) To what extent do engagements with diverse technical experts
across these systems foster reflexive learning and deliberation
over broader emerging alternative forms of social and technological
order, and ultimately inform expert practices and technological
design choices? (Years Two and Three)
Previous STIR projects embedded humanists in engineering and
science laboratories for (often
comparative and sequential) 12-week studies. STIR Cities’
multi-sited approach, however, and
its focus on longer-term outcomes suggest that our engagements
should occur not over 12 weeks
and sequentially, but over 12 months and simultaneously. To
date, STIR studies have not
consistently employed a post-program evaluation phase to
document whether social science
engagement continues to foster reflexive expert practices and
the alignment of innovation goals
and societal concerns. Year One of STIR Cities will thus focus
on capturing historical,
documentary, and ethnographic evidence on the underlying
imaginaries that inform the everyday
practices of technical experts engaged in urban smart grid
development. Ethnographic data
collection will also serve to inform how the STIR protocol
should alter to address the differing
social and cultural dynamics of the energy policy and
development space. It is our expectation
that actors in this space, unlike scientists in academic
laboratory settings alone, will express more
reflexivity towards the societal outcomes of their work.
Capturing where these cognitive
boundaries exist and are performed by actors will be crucial for
reflexive engagement in Year
Two, as will the empirical documentation of changes in reflexive
learning, value deliberation and
-
Richter J. et al
16
practical adjustments during the active engagements. Year Three
will address the question of
longer-term, post-study evaluation, and empirically examine how
experts may continue to
change their practices as well as their more general
performances of sociotechnical imaginaries
and recognition of societal values related to smart grid
development.
In Phoenix, sites of engagement were evaluated based on their
larger influence on the
network of development around smart grid technologies. The
initial list included, but was not
limited to: city planning offices (City of Phoenix, City of
Tempe, City of Chandler, for example),
utility smart grid program management offices (APS and SRP); the
Arizona Corporation
Commission (AZCC); individual power plants (such as the Palo
Verde Nuclear Generating
Station, or the Ocotillo power plant); and local university
engineering research groups engaged
in locally or nationally-funded smart grid projects.4 These
sites played a role in previous smart
grid developments, and in turn are appropriate locations to
document and engage with the
performances of experts who have already had a material impact
on the lives of citizens via
energy system technologies. For example, low-income family smart
energy programs (such as
M-Power®) have included such varying actors as the City of
Phoenix Public Works office,
Arizona State University’s Global Institute of Sustainability,
SRP, APS, and the Arizona State
Legislature (Dalrymple 2014; Neenan and Robinson 2010).
Mapping the network of relations that underlie smart grid
development in an urban
setting, and using this space to target key sites for productive
embedded engagement with
technical experts, will serve not only to make explicit and
visible in everyday experience the
performances that underlie how we conceptualize our
energy-centric society, but in doing so
foster a space for reflexive engagement towards altering
practices to incorporate the societal
concerns outlined in the case studies above. Energy systems
designs and social outcomes are not
inevitable; they are the product of a cultural history of energy
producing, transporting, and
consuming infrastructures, embedded in a system of social norms
and values and developed by
experts who only ever see a part of the very systems they work
with daily. Productive and
reflexive engagement, such as is the objective with STIR Cities,
has the potential to inflect not
only the devices and systems Phoenicians encounter, but also how
they experience the meaning
and materiality of these systems as a matter of their daily
lives.
Funding:
-
Richter J. et al
17
This material is based upon work supported by the National
Science Foundation under Grant No. 1535120.
Notes:
1. The exception to this is the work on social movements – as
Hess (2015) points out, there are many synergies
between Social Movement Studies (SMS) and Sociotechnical
Imaginaries. We agree with his emphasis on
tracing the social position and power dynamics underlying the
production of imaginaries, and will address
this element in more depth during subsequent STIR Cities
studies.
2. Studies since the first Oil Crisis in the 1970s also indicate
that lower income families in urban areas tend to
be the first to cut their energy consumption when prices rise,
indicating that these individuals and families are
conscious energy consumers, albeit unwillingly (see Unseld,
Morrison, Sils and Wolf 1979).
3. These exceptions, however, do not apply to multiple renters
splitting a bill via M-Power® - as a 2015 Arizona
Republic article showed (Randazzo 2015b). The lack of an
explicit mechanism for addressing these split-bill
outcomes is peculiar, given M-Power® explicitly targets students
and other non-related multi-person renters
for the program.
4. For the purposes of anonymity this list is comprised of
high-level organizational examples of potential sites,
as opposed to the specific sites our study will include.
References
Cayan, Daniel R., Tapash Das, David W. Pierce, Timp P. Barentt,
Mary Tyree, and Alexander Gershunov. 2010. “Future Dryness in the
Southwest US and the Hydrology of the Early 21st Century Drought.”
PNAS 107 (50): 21271-21276. DOI:10.1073/pnas.0912391107.
Cowan, Ruth Schwartz. 1983. More Work for Mother: The Ironies of
Household Technology from the Open Hearth to the Microwave. New
York, NY: Basic Books.
Dalrymple, Mick. 2014. Energize Phoenix Year Three Report.
Phoenix, AZ: Arizona State University.
Edwards, Paul. 2004. “Infrastructure and Modernity: Force, Time,
and Social Organization in the History of Sociotechnical Systems.”
In Modernity and Technology, edited by T. J. Misa, P. Brey and A.
Feenberg. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
Feynman, Richard. 2011 [1969]. “What is Science.” Resonance 16
(9):860-873.
Fisher, E. (2007). Ethnographic Invention: Probing the Capacity
of Laboratory Decisions. NanoEthics 1 (2): 155-165. DOI:
10.1007/s11569-007-0016-5
Fisher, Erik, Roop L. Mahajan, and Carl Mitcham. 2006.
“Midstream Modulation of Technology: Governance From Within.”
Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society 26 (6): 485-496. DOI:
10.1177/0270467606295402.
-
Richter J. et al
18
Fisher, Erik, Michael O'Rourke, Robert Evans, Eric B. Kennedy,
Michael E. Gorman, and Thomas P. Seager. 2015. “Mapping the
Integrative Field: Taking Stock of Socio-technical Collaborations.”
Journal of Responsible Innovation 2 (1): 39-61.
DOI:10.1080/23299460.2014.1001671.
Fisher, E., & Schuurbiers, D. 2013. “Socio-technical
Integration Research: Collaborative Inquiry at the Midstream of
Research and Development.” In Early Engagement and New
Technologies: Opening Up the Laboratory (pp. 97-110). Springer
Netherlands.
Flipse, S. M., van der Sanden, M. C., & Osseweijer, P.
(2013). “Midstream Modulation in Biotechnology Industry: Redefining
What Is ‘Part of the Job’ of Researchers in Industry.” Science and
Engineering Ethics, 19(3), 1141-1164. DOI:
10.1007/s11948-012-9411-6.
Hess, David J. 2015. “Publics as Threats? Integrating Science
and Technology Studies and Social Movement Studies.” Science as
Culture 24 (1): 69-82. DOI:10.1080/09505431.2014.986319
Howat, John, and Jillian McLaughlin. 2012. Rethinking Prepaid
Utlity Service: Customers at Risk. Boston, MA: National Consumer
Law Center.
Hughes, Thomas P. 1993 [1983]. Networks of Power:
Electrification in Western Society: 1880-1930. The Johns Hopkins
University Press: Baltimore, MD.
Jasanoff, Sheila, and Sang-Hyun Kim. 2009. “Containing the Atom:
Sociotechnical Imaginaries and Nuclear Power in the United States
and South Korea.” Minerva 47 (2):119-146.
DOI:10.1007/s11024-009-9124-4. Jasanoff, Sheila, and Sang-Hyun
Kim, eds. 2015. Dreamscapes of Modernity: Sociotechnical
Imaginaries and the Fabrication of Power. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press. In press. Jones, Christopher F. 2014. Routes of
Power: Energy and Modern America. Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press.
Kuletz, Valerie L. 1998. The Tainted Desert: Environmental Ruin
in the American West. New York, NY; London, UK: Routledge.
Kupel, Douglas E. 2003. Fuel For Growth: Water and Arizona's
Urban Environment. Tucson: The University of Arizona Press.
Landry, Alysa. 2015. “Not alone in the dark: Navajo Nation’s
lack of electricity problem.” Indian Country Today, February 22.
http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2015/02/11/not-alone-dark-navajo-nations-lack-electricity-problem-159135
Laird, Frank N. 2013. “Against Transitions? Uncovering Conflicts
in Changing Energy Systems.” Science and Culture 22 (2): 149-156.
DOI: 10.1080/09505431.2013.786992.
-
Richter J. et al
19
---------2001. Solar Energy, Technology Policy, and
Institutional Values. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Miller, Clark A., Jennifer Richter, and Jason O’Leary. 2015.
“Socio-energy systems design: A policy framework for energy
transitions.” Energy Research & Social Science 6 (March 2015):
29-40.
Mitchell, Timothy. 2011. Carbon Democracy: Political Power in
the Age of Oil. New York, NY: Verso.
Necefer, Len, Gabrielle Wong-Parodi, Paulina Jaramillo, and
Mitchell J. Small. 2015. “Energy Development and the Native
Americans: Values and Beliefs About Energy from the Navajo Nation.”
Energy Research & Social Science 7: 1-11.
DOI:10.1016/j.erss.2015.02.007.
Needham, Andrew. 2014. Power Lines: Phoenix and the Making of
the Modern Southwest. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press.
Needham, Andrew. 2010. “’A Piece of the Action’: Navajo
Nationalism, Energy Development, and Metropolitan Inequality.” In
Indians and Energy: Exploitation and Opportunity in the American
Southwest. Santa Fe: School for Advanced Research.
Neenan, B., and J. Robinson. 2010. Paying Upfront: A Review of
Salt River Project’s M-Power Prepaid Program. Palo Alto, CA:
Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI).
Nye, David E. 1990. Electrifying America: Social Meanings of a
New Technology, 1880-1940. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
Owen, Richard, Phil Macnaghten, and Jack Stilgoe. 2012.
“Responsible Research and Innovation: From Science in Society to
Science for Society, With Society.” Science and Public Policy 39
(6): 751-760. DOI: 10.1093/scipol/scs093.
Purcell, David, Mark Chediak, and Margaret Newkirk. 2015.
“Shareholders Revolt Against Dark Money.” Bloomberg, May 14.
http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-05-14/shareholders-revolt-against-dark-money.
Rabinbach, Anson. 1990. The Human Motor: Energy, Fatigue, and
the Origins of Modernity. New York: Basic Books.
Randazzo, Ryan. 2015a. SRP board Oks rate hike, new fees for
solar customers. Arizona Republic, February 26.
http://www.azcentral.com/story/money/business/2015/02/26/srp-board-oks-rate-hike-new-fees-solar-customers/24086473/.
---------2015b. APS, SRP customers can owe roommate's unpaid
utility bills. Arizona Republic, July 13.
http://www.azcentral.com/story/money/business/2015/07/13/arizona-utility-bills-transferred-roommate-aps-srp/29991431/.
-
Richter J. et al
20
Reisner, Marc. 1986. Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its
Disappearing Water. New York: Viking Penguin.
Salt River Project. 2013a. Contact: News for SRP M-Power
Customers August 2013.
Salt River Project. 2013b. SRP M-Power® User's Manual.
Salt River Project. 2014a. Learn how the smart grid will deliver
more reliable energy to your home 2014 [cited April 5 2014].
Available from
http://www.srpnet.com/electric/home/grid/default.aspx.
Salt River Project. 2014b. M-Power pre-paid electricity price
plan 2014 [cited April 5 2014]. Available from
http://www.srpnet.com/payment/mpower/default.aspx#say.
Salt River Project. 2015a. A History of the Salt River Project
[cited July 23 2015]. Available from
http://www.srpnet.com/about/history/default.aspx.
Schuurbiers, D. (2011). What Happens in the Lab: Applying
Midstream Modulation to Enhance Critical Reflection in the
Laboratory. Science and Engineering Ethics, 17 (4), 769-788. DOI:
10.1007/s11948-011-9317-8
Schuurbiers, D., & Fisher, E. (2009). Lab‐Scale
Intervention. EMBO reports, 10 (5), 424-427. Schwartz, Judith.
2012. Salt River Project (SRP): The Persistence of Consumer
Choice.
Washington, DC: Association for Demand Response & Smart
Grid.
Shove, Elizabeth, and Gordon Walker. 2014. “What Is Energy For?
Social Practice and Energy Demand.” Theory, Culture & Society
31 (5):41-58. DOI: 10.1177/0263276414536746
Slayton, Rebecca. 2013. "Efficient, Secure Green: Digital
Utopianism and the Challenge of Making the Electrical Grid
"Smart"." Information & Culture 48 (4):448-478.
Smith, Crosbie. 1998. The Science of Energy: A Cultural History
of Energy Physics in Victorian Britain. London: The University of
Chicago Press.
Smith, Merritt Roe, and Leo Marx, eds. 1994. Does Technology
Drive History? The Dilemma of Technological Determinism. Cambridge,
MA: The MIT Press.
Sovacool, Benjamin K., and Marilyn A. Brown. 2015.
“Deconstructing Facts and Frames in Energy Research: Maxims for
Evaluating Contentious Problems.” Energy Policy 86:36-42.
DOI:10.1016/j.enpol.2015.06.020
Steinberg, Ted. 2009. Down to Earth: Nature’s Role in American
History. New York: Oxford University Press.
Stilgoe, Jack, Richard Owen, and Phil Macnaghten. 2013.
“Developing a Framework for Responsible Innovation.” Research
Policy 42 (9):1568-1580. DOI:10.1016/j.respol.2013.05.008
-
Richter J. et al
21
Theobald, Bill. 2015. Census: Phoenix Area Grew Rapidly. Arizona
Republic, March 26.
http://www.azcentral.com/story/news/arizona/politics/2015/03/26/census-phoenix-area-population-grew-rapidly/70507534/.
Trabish, Herman K. 2013. “Arizona Utility Funds Solar Smear
Campaign, Saying it is ‘Obligated to Fight.’” Greentech Media
Solar, October 22.
http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/arizona-utility-admits-funding-anti-solar-ad-campaign.
Unseld, Charles T., Denton E. Morrison, David L. Sills, and C.P.
Wolf. 1979. Supporting Paper 5: Sociopolitical Effects of Energy
Use and Policy. Edited by Committee on Nuclear and Alternative
Energy Systems National Research Council, Reports to the
Sociopolitical Effects Resource Group, Risk and Impact Panel.
Washington, D.C.: National Academy of Sciences.
Wilshire, Howard G., Jane E. Nelson, and Richard W. Hazlett.
2008. The American West at Risk: Science, Myths, and Politics of
Land Abuse and Recovery. New York: Oxford University Press.
Winner, Langdon. 1986. The Whale and the Reactor: A Search for
Limits in an Age of High Technology. Chicago, IL: University of
Chicago Press.
Wynne, Brian. 2011. “Lab Work Goes Social, and Vice Versa:
Strategising Public Engagement Processes.” Science and Engineering
Ethics 17 (4):791-800. DOI: 10.1007/s11948-011-9316-9.
Ye, Lin and Nancy Grimm. 2013. “Modelling Potential Impacts of
Climate Change on Water and Soil Nitrate Export from a Mid-Sized,
Semi-Arid Watershed in the US Southwest.” Climatic Change 129 (2).
DOI: 10.1007/s10584-013-0827-z.