SCI workshop on climate and sustainability emergencies as socio-technical challenges

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On 30th June SCI Research Associate Torik Holmes and his collaborators Carla de Laurentis and Rebecca Windemer (University of the West of England) held an SCI-funded workshop on '(Re)making infrastructures in response to sustainability and climate emergencies' at Alliance Manchester Business School.

The workshop brought together researchers to discuss current and longer-term climate and sustainability emergencies as socio-technical challenges connected with the ordering of digital, transport, electricity, gas, water, and waste infrastructures. It explicitly dealt with questions concerning the dual role infrastructures play in helping to constitute and address various emergencies over time and across space. It also provided a platform to discuss and explore the conceptual and practical challenges associated with studying infrastructures, sustainability, and climate emergencies in tandem, and themes including: materiality; spatiality and scale; temporality and timeframes; and other social, political, and economic dimensions of the topic at hand.

Before a collaborative and creative afternoon session the workshop attendees heard from Adam Peirce of Climate Emergency Manchester and SCI Director Mat Paterson, as they gave talks about how institutions respond to the challenges of adopting strategies to combat climate change.

If you are interested in the outputs of this workshop please get in touch with Torik Holmes (torik.holmes@manchester.ac.uk)