Net Zero Precincts: experimenting with transition through everyday experiences

Net Zero Precincts is a four-year Australian Research Council (ARC) Linkage project that brings together two key areas of research for the first time — transition management and design anthropology — to trial a new interdisciplinary approach to net-zero transitions that accounts for the complications and possibilities associated with everyday human futures. The project uses the Monash University Clayton Campus and Monash Technology Precinct as an action-oriented living lab to experiment, test and learn about net-zero transitions in a real-world setting. This presentation details findings from Stage 1 of the project based on over 50 qualitative interviews with participants living, working, commuting or connected to the Monash University Clayton Campus and the surrounding precinct. The interdisciplinary process being developed explicitly connects with the everyday experiences and challenges of the people involved in transitions. Net Zero Precincts is being undertaken in collaboration with an interdisciplinary team of researchers from Monash Sustainable Development Institute, Monash Art, Design and Architecture, Faculty of Information Technology and Faculty of Arts. Partners in the Linkage include ENGIE, the City of Monash, ICLEI Oceania, the CSIRO, the City of Greater Dandenong, Energy Efficiency Council and Swinburne University.

Format:

• 5 min welcome and introduction
• 30 min presentation 
• 15 min Q&A facilitated by Hedda Ransan-Cooper, Social Science Research Leader, Battery Storage and Grid Integration Program 

About the speaker

Dr Darren Sharp is Senior Research Fellow at Monash Sustainable Development Institute and a sustainability transitions researcher interested in urban experimentation, living labs, grassroots innovations and the sharing economy. His work is situated at the intersection of transition management, design for social innovation and community economies thinking, with a particular interest in collaborative governance of urban transition arenas. Darren co-led the urban living lab Livewell Yarra which used action research to empower local residents to reduce their carbon emissions at an individual, household and community level. His research speaks to the possibilities of social learning, institutional arrangements, and new urban imaginaries to drive the transformation of cities towards sustainability. Darren is taking these insights into his role as the Interdisciplinary Research Lead of the Net Zero Precincts ARC Linkage project that brings together a new approach to transition management by using design anthropology to engage with the precinct community and consider their lived experiences.