Renewing Injustice: A Multi-Scalar Analysis of Renewable Energy Development in Chile’s Atacama Desert

Abstract

The goal of this dissertation is to examine the Chilean energy transition, and particularly the recent boom in utility scale wind and solar energies, from a multiscalar, multi-sited perspective. It is guided by two main questions: a) how is the Chilean energy transition governed and what is the resulting balance between state, market, and civil society actors in the resulting energy regime and b) what does the energy transition mean for communities in areas of high concentration of renewable energy generation projects. Combining insights from political ecology and political economy, I pursue these questions across research in Santiago, Chile’s capital, and in the Antofagasta region of the Atacama Desert, specifically, two community research sites, Taltal and Calama, areas which have experienced a boom in renewable energies in recent years. This dissertation is based on a total of 12 months of field work in Chile where I conducted semi-structured interviews, document analysis, and participant observation as the main methods of data collection. I find that despite recent efforts to make energy governance in Chile more participatory, recent changes are best understood as a market perfecting and enabling of global renewable firms to extract profit. I show that via market mechanisms as the primary tool of governance, risk must be allocated in particular ways to invite and protect investment. I argue that this model is problematic for two main reasons: a) it links expanded renewable energy production to the continued and expanding extraction of minerals, and b) by catering to the needs of global firms, it perpetuates socio-environmental conflict and injustice at the local scale, particularly in Indigenous communities. Thus, in many ways the renewable energy boom resembles past rounds of capitalist production with highly uneven distribution of costs and benefits. What is novel, however, is that the renewables boom is presented as a solution to the climate crisis. This work underscores the necessity for a reimagined governance approach that truly supports just and equitable energy futures.