Innovation and institutional change: the transition to a sustainable ...

Conclusions 227
exploration of long-term developments in the energy system (EZ, 2000) and
on consultation with a number of stakeholders also a number of promising
and robust transition routes were selected: new gas, chain efficiency, green
resources, and sustainable Rijnmond. Project teams were formed for these
themes and in 2002 and 2003 these project groups developed general visions
and a set of more specific paths through a process of workshops and
interviews (EZ project group, 2002ab, 2003ab). Based on these reports
discussion took place and further ideas were developed, leading to five main
routes in 2004, see Table 8.3. The recent energy report of 2005 also
proposed a sixth route: clean fossil (EZ, 2005).
Table 8.3 Main routes and paths in the energy transition (AER/VROM,
2004: 232)
Main routes Recognised transition paths in 2004
Efficient and green gas Energy saving buildings
Micro and mini cogeneration
Clean natural gas
Green gas
Energy saving horticulture
Chain efficiency
Renewal of production systems
Sustainable agricultural chain
Sustainable paper chain
Green resources
Biomass production
Biomass conversion
Biosyngas
Bioplastics
Alternative motor fuels Natural gas
Biofuels
Sustainable electricity Biomass
Wind
Based on an assessment of the process and routes in the energy transition in
the perspective of our analysis of paths taken in the energy system we make
the following observations and suggestions.
Observation 1: Incumbents dominate the process
First, there is a relative narrow range of actors involved as reported in the
initial visions and in the stakeholder consultation. There is a bias to a
business approach to the energy transition, with strong representation of
multinationals and energy companies, but under representation of actors
such as the construction firms, housing companies, and consumer groups.
This may provide some part of the explanation for the rather narrow and
technological orientation of most of the proposed routes, because
homogeneous networks are much more unlikely to produce ‘out of the box’