Energy Cafe: Altered landscapes of a post‑carbon future

Altered landscapes of a post‑carbon future: Visual response imaginaries as experiences of energy infrastructure in the Orkney Islands

Hosted by Neil Gordon Davey

Online Only

This presentation explores how residents of the Orkney Islands visually and emotionally respond to renewable energy infrastructure. Based on a year of visual ethnographic research, it introduces the concept of ‘visual response imaginaries’ – the personal and sensory ways people engage with changing energy landscapes. By combining photography, participant narratives, and interdisciplinary theory, the study critiques dominant energy transition narratives and highlights the need for more inclusive, community-centered approaches. The findings reveal that energy infrastructure is not just seen, but lived and felt, offering new insights into the aesthetics and everyday politics of landscape change.

The Energy Café is an informal, open and inclusive space where people across our network, from undergraduates to Professors Emeriti, can come together for an hour to share ideas about the energy research they are working on. It is intended to encourage collaborations, expand research horizons, and inspire new ideas and questions about issues of energy.

Fostering collaboration and interdisciplinarity are at the heart of the Centre’s ethos and the motivation for the Café. By openly exchanging ideas with others and working across disciplines, the Energy Café offers a unique venue that celebrates the diversity of roles and contributions individuals make to energy research and research culture.