Solar Power and its Discontents: Critiquing Off-grid Infrastructures of Inclusion in East Africa
Solar Power and its Discontents: Critiquing Off-grid Infrastructures of Inclusion in East Africa
复制标题
太阳能及其不满：批评东非离网包容性基础设施
DOI：
10.1111/dech.12668
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发表时间：
2021
影响因子：
3
通讯作者：
Cross J
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Cross J
自2010年以来，北美和欧洲的太阳能公司在为撒哈拉以南非洲数百万生活在电网之外的人们提供清洁，可靠和可持续的电力方面发挥了关键作用。然而，今天，非洲的离网太阳能不再被视为一种纯粹的社会和经济利益。私募股权投资的流入导致离网太阳能公司的员工和客户质疑该行业的商业动态。他们的批评解决了太阳能家庭系统的错误销售以及国内生产的离网基础设施的技术限制，这些限制都是由主导市场范式以及与国家，社区和家庭的关系所构成的。借鉴东非离网太阳能产业的民族志实地考察，本研究将这些关键观点汇集到离网太阳能作为不利的“包容性基础设施”的更广泛分析中。
Since 2010, solar energy companies in North America and Europe have played a pivotal role in delivering clean, reliable and sustainable electricity to millions of people living off the grid across sub‐Saharan Africa. However, today, off‐grid solar energy in Africa is no longer seen as an unmitigated social and economic good. Inflows of private equity investment have led the employees and customers of off‐grid solar companies to question the industry's commercial dynamics. Their critiques address the mis‐selling of solar home systems and the technical limits of off‐grid infrastructures for domestic production, framed both by dominant market paradigms and by relationships to nation, community and family. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork in East Africa's off‐grid solar industry, this study assembles these critical perspectives into a wider analysis of off‐grid solar power as an adverse ‘infrastructure of inclusion’.