Exploring the Mundane: Towards an Ethnographic Approach to Bioenergy

Abstract This article introduces the concept of ‘mundane bioenergy’, the largest source of renewable energy utilized by human society. While the term ‘renewable energy’ evokes images of solar panels and wind turbines, most renewable energy is used in a different form. This ‘mundane’ and largely invisible form of energy use takes place when families burn wood, dung, charcoal, and crop residue in cookstoves for their subsistence needs. We call on more energy ethnographers to grapple with mundane energy issues and strengthen this small but growing field of scholarship. Limited ethnographic scholarship on mundane energy issues leads to a partial understanding of emic perspectives and failed development initiatives. By sharing insights from our ongoing ethnographic research on mundane bioenergy, we demonstrate the value of bringing such insights into conversation with research in energy studies.

[1]  W. Tyner,et al.  Biofuels, Policy Options, and Their Implications: Analyses Using Partial and General Equilibrium Approaches , 2008 .

[2]  A. Agrawal.  Environmentality: Technologies of Government and the Making of Subjects , 2005 .

[3]  P. Blaikie,et al.  The political economy of soil erosion in developing countries , 1985 .

[4]  A. Jacobson.  Connective Power: Solar Electrification and Social Change in Kenya , 2004 .

[5]  B. DeAngelo,et al.  Bounding the role of black carbon in the climate system: A scientific assessment , 2013 .

[6]  J. Donald Hughes,et al.  Green Imperialism: Colonial Expansion, Tropical Island Edens and the Origins of Environmentalism, 1600-1860 , 1996 .

[7]  Akhil Gupta.  Postcolonial Developments: Agriculture in the Making of Modern India , 1998 .

[8]  M. Linderman,et al.  Why Have Improved Cook-Stove Initiatives in India Failed? , 2017 .

[9]  R. D. Hanbar,et al.  National Programme on Improved Chulha (NPIC) of the Government of India: an overview , 2002 .

[10]  Tania M. Li,et al.  The Will To Improve: Governmentality, Development, and the Practice of Politics Tania Murray Li , 2008 .

[11]  Siwa Msangi,et al.  Biofuels production in developing countries: assessing tradeoffs in welfare and food security , 2009 .

[12]  Peter B. Dixon,et al.  Economywide Implications from US Bioenergy Expansion , 2010 .

[13]  N. Saxena.  India′s Eucalyptus Craze: The God that Failed , 1994 .

[14]  Sumi Mehta,et al.  Solid Fuel Use for Household Cooking: Country and Regional Estimates for 1980–2010 , 2013, Environmental health perspectives.

[15]  Tom Kompas,et al.  Substitution Between Bio-Fuels and Fossil Fuels: Is There a Green Paradox? , 2012 .

[16]  Keith Openshaw,et al.  Cleaner Hearths, Better Homes: New Stoves for India and the Developing World , 2012 .

[17]  C. Geertz.  Thick Description: Towards an Interpretive Theory of Culture , 1973 .

[18]  Alan Costall,et al.  The emotional connotations of color: A qualitative investigation , 2008 .

[19]  M. Leach,et al.  Environmental Change and Policy , 2008 .

[20]  B. Armstrong,et al.  Public health benefits of strategies to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions: household energy , 2009, The Lancet.

[21]  Subhes C. Bhattacharyya,et al.  Applied general equilibrium models for energy studies: a survey , 1996 .

[22]  Channing Arndt,et al.  Biofuels, poverty, and growth: a computable general equilibrium analysis of Mozambique , 2009, Environment and Development Economics.

[23]  M. N. Matinga.  "We grow up with it" : an ethnographic study of the experiences, perceptions and responses to the health impacts of energy acquisition and use in rural South Africa , 2010 .

[24]  R. Chambers.  Rural Poverty Unperceived: Problems and Remedies , 1980 .

[25]  Les G. Firbank,et al.  Assessing the Ecological Impacts of Bioenergy Projects , 2008, BioEnergy Research.

[26]  V.V.N Kishore,et al.  Improved cookstoves in rural India: how improved are they? , 2002 .

[27]  A. Faaij,et al.  From the global efforts on certification of bioenergy towards an integrated approach based on sustainable land use planning , 2010 .

[28]  Robert Bailis,et al.  Perceptions of stakeholders about nontraditional cookstoves in Honduras , 2012 .

[29]  Kirk R. Smith,et al.  In Praise of Petroleum? , 2002, Science.

[30]  A. Sen,et al.  Rational Fools: A Critique of the Behavioral Foundations of Economic Theory , 1977 .

[31]  J. Dwyer,et al.  The Significance of Urban Trees and Forests: Toward a Deeper Understanding of Values , 1991, Arboriculture & Urban Forestry.

[32]  Michael Greenstone,et al.  Up in Smoke: The Influence of Household Behavior on the Long-Run Impact of Improved Cooking Stoves , 2012 .

[33]  Manfred Lenzen,et al.  Renewable Energy in the Context of Sustainable Development , 2011 .

[34]  O. Masera,et al.  Environmental Burden of Traditional Bioenergy Use , 2015 .

[35]  B. Atanassov.  Socio-cultural dimensions in household cooking energy choice : Implications for energy transition in Catembe, Mozambique , 2010 .

[36]  E. Cecelski.  Energy and Rural Women's Work: Crisis Response and Policy Alternatives , 1987 .

[37]  Xiaoke Wang,et al.  Emission of particulate matter and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons from select cookstove¿fuel systems in Asia , 2005 .

[38]  Christine L. Crago,et al.  Carbon Abatement in the Fuel Market with Biofuels: Implications for Second-Best Policies , 2014 .

[39]  M. Thompson,et al.  Uncertainty on a Himalayan scale : an institutional theory of environmental perception and a strategic framework for the sustainable development of the Himalaya , 1987 .

[40]  Judy Pearsall,et al.  Oxford Dictionary of English , 2010 .

[41]  B. Agarwal,et al.  Cold hearths and barren slopes: The woodfuel crisis in the Third World , 1986 .

[42]  N. Peluso,et al.  Social Forestry in Java: Reorienting Management Systems , 1989 .

[43]  Ken R. Smith,et al.  Adoption and sustained use of improved cookstoves , 2011 .

[44]  D. Kammen,et al.  Science, Society and the Environment: Applying Anthropology and Physics to Sustainability , 2015 .

[45]  Sumi Mehta,et al.  Millions dead: how do we know and what does it mean? Methods used in the comparative risk assessment of household air pollution. , 2014, Annual review of public health.

[46]  Robert Pollin,et al.  Greening the Global Economy , 2015 .

[47]  Subhrendu K. Pattanayak,et al.  Who Adopts Improved Fuels and Cookstoves? A Systematic Review , 2012, Environmental health perspectives.

[48]  Robert Bailis,et al.  Current debates and future research needs in the clean cookstove sector , 2014 .

[49]  M. Dove.  Foresters' beliefs about farmers: a priority for social science research in social forestry , 2004, Agroforestry Systems.

[50]  Ole Mertz,et al.  Challenging the Woodfuel Crisis in West African Woodlands , 2011 .

[51]  Michael Schröder,et al.  Choosing environmental policy instruments using general equilibrium models , 1993 .

[52]  B. Sovacool.  What Are We Doing Here? Analyzing Fifteen Years of Energy Scholarship and Proposing a Social Science Research Agenda , 2014 .

[53]  R. Ghanadan.  Negotiating reforms at home: Natural resources and the politics of energy access in urban Tanzania , 2004 .

[54]  Sarmila Bose.  Money, Energy and Welfare: The State and the Household in India's Rural Electrification Policy , 1994 .

[55]  Stephen Sartarelli,et al.  Nature and Its Symbols , 2004 .

[56]  Jianlong Wang,et al.  Auto-flotation of heterocyst enables the efficient production of renewable energy in cyanobacteria , 2014, Scientific Reports.

[57]  Omar Masera,et al.  The carbon footprint of traditional woodfuels , 2015 .

[58]  Ken R. Smith.  What's Cooking? A Brief Update , 2010 .

[59]  Dustin Mulvaney,et al.  Green Energy: An A-to-Z Guide , 2011 .

[60]  S. Strauss,et al.  Cultures of Energy: Power, Practices, Technologies , 2013 .

[61]  Robert Bailis,et al.  Low demand for nontraditional cookstove technologies , 2012, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[62]  P. Visaria.  Poverty and unemployment in India : an analysis of recent evidence , 1981 .

[63]  Veerabhadran Ramanathan,et al.  Can Currently Available Advanced Combustion Biomass Cook-Stoves Provide Health Relevant Exposure Reductions? Results from Initial Assessment of Select Commercial Models in India , 2015, EcoHealth.

[64]  N. Jodha.  Population Growth and the Decline of Common Property Resources in Rajasthan, India , 1985 .