Technological Trajectories for Climate Change Mitigation in China, Europe and India

This project is funded by the Swedish Riksbankens Jubileumsfond which promotes research on 'Europe and Global Challenges'. The global challenge which this project concentrates on is the need to mitigate climate change through technological innovation. Europe is in a strong position to advance the relevant technologies.

However, Europe's ability to make a difference to climate change depends on involving China and India in the search for and application of technical solutions. This is difficult because the economic conditions and political pressures in India and China are very different from those in Europe.

This is the starting point for this project which addresses two questions: a) how and why do the emerging technological trajectories in Europe, China and India differ; and b) what are the implications for strategies of international competition and cooperation at the enterprise and government level. The research will be carried out by integrating different disciplines and methods and by concentrating the empirical analysis on two sectors: wind energy and electro mobility.

Objective

Mitigating climate change before it changes the world dramatically is a globally shared target. Climate change mitigation through technological innovation is therefore a global challenge. Europe is in a strong position to advance relevant technologies. However, Europe's ability to make a difference to climate change depends on involving China and India in the search for and application of technological solutions.

Against this background, the research project addresses the questions of how and why the emerging trajectories for climate mitigation technologies in China, Europe and India differ and derives implications for strategies of international cooperation and competition at the enterprise and government level.

Approach

The research will be carried out by integrating different disciplines and methods, and by concentrating the empirical analysis on two sectors: wind energy and electric vehicles. It starts from the idea that different technological trajectories, i.e. clusters of technological directions are possible under the new technological paradigm of climate change mitigation. Technological trajectories are problem solving activities determined by this paradigm.

Technological trajectories in the three countries and two sectors of interest could differ for a number of reasons, namely different normative values and policy targets which determine policy and technology choices as well as policy instrument choices, embeddedness in different governance regimes, development stages and market potential of the countries, experiences with technological trajectories and innovation under different paradigms, the development stage of different firms as well as (the degree of) integration into global production networks and value chains.

The project will start by identifying and analysing the strategies and actor constellations in China, Europe and India relevant to technological trajectories in the wind and electric vehicle sectors. It will proceed with field research (interview based) with key actors aiming at identifying critical innovation events (innovations and influencing factors such as policies, market situation, other actors, coevolution of technologies etc.) that have determined the technological trajectories within each country and sector.

Activities

The activities of the project in each country are organised according to the two level approach described above. Strategy and actor constellation analysis will be carried out in the first year, based on a combination of desk research and interviews with key stakeholders. The sectoral research on technological trajectories will be conducted in the second year, based on interviews in China, India and Europe. Integration of the project components and dissemination of results (papers, policy briefs and book) will be done during the third year.