Energy prices are soaring throughout the United States, and in California. This is occurring at a time when the ‘too cheap to meter’ resources are increasing shares of energy production. So, what is going on? This talk posits, for discussion, the possibility that renewable resources are incommensurate with the twentieth century utility, built on thermal energy resources and extensive transmission infrastructure. It suggests that a totally different approach to the incumbent energy systems needs to be taken seriously in order to ensure affordable and resilient energy provision in the future.

Bio

Stephanie Pincetl is Professor and Founding Director of the Center for Sustainable Communities at the UCLA Institute of the Environment. Dr. Pincetl conducts research on environmental policies and governance, and is expert in bringing together interdisciplinary teams of researchers across the biophysical and engineering sciences with the social sciences to address problems of complex urban systems and environmental management. Her commitment is to conduct science in the public interest and that advances social and environmental justice. She has a PhD in urban planning and conducted extensive research on land use in California.

She conducts research on cities, how they impact resources far and near such as energy sources and energy distribution systems, and how such resources are used in cities, where, by whom, and to do what. She focuses on quantifying those flows, and how institutions, regulations and rules shape the ways the flows are appropriated. This work is coupled to understandings of how cities are built (including infrastructures) and organized. She has created the first ever interactive energy web atlas that describes building energy use in Southern California and the San Francisco Bay Area (www.energyatlas.ucla.edu). She has conducted extensive research with California Energy Commission, Strategic Growth Council, Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, and County research on energy and sustainability, and has written extensively about California land use, sustainability and urban greening. She has also conducted research on fire in California.