Espen Moe

An overview of the possibilities and pitfalls of renewable energy.

The world is moving in two counteracting directions. A renewable world is a networked world, with regions physically tied together in international power grids, taking us toward integration and interdependence. Simultaneously, increasing geopolitical hostility mandates greater national control over energy access and supply chains, leading to a renewed emphasis on sovereignty and rivalry. This chapter discusses the prospects of new maritime energy infrastructures (offshore wind and subsea cables) in a world of geopolitical rivalry. There are two main hurdles. First, international power grids challenge traditional notions of sovereignty. If there are major power disparities between interconnecting states, cross-border interconnections may create asymmetric dependencies rather than interdependencies. We illustrate this by a comparison of the prospects for a North Sea power grid vs. an Asian Super Grid. Second, there are security challenges. Geopolitical rivalries produce a far greater need for the physical protection of maritime infrastructures, at the exact same time as the green energy transition means that there is a massive increase in infrastructure requiring protection.

This review article provides a comprehensive multidisciplinary and in-depth analysis of how the idea of Global Carbon Markets (GCM) has evolved from the Kyoto Protocol to the Paris Agreement and the post-Paris Agreement period (2015–2022) and why no real consensus has been reached after 25 years of negotiations, based on the categorisation of different arguments from different authors. We apply a semi-systematic review to 32 scientific articles, special reports, and relevant websites to analyse the failure in reaching international consensus on GCM. We apply three dichotomies, market vs. non-market-based approaches, top-down vs. bottom-up and national vs. international level. There are two striking findings. First (out of the articles that can easily be placed along all three dichotomies), there is an overwhelming majority of articles combining market-based, top-down, and international level explanations. This is however countered by a second finding, namely, that there is also a clear historical trend which is unlikely to change away from top-down and towards bottom-up approaches since the Paris agreement, combined with a movement towards more non-market-based and national approaches.