PhD Topic/Title: Democratising the Water-Energy-Food Nexus: Sustainable Energy Technologies in Informal Settlements

Research

This research investigates the relationship between sustainable energy implementation and water and food security and will adhere to the need to focus approaches on livelihoods in urban informal settlements in the Global South. Theoretically the work will further explore and draw extensively on new perspectives of linking energy research in geography to questions of democracy and justice within the energy trilemma. This study aims to contribute to the development of existing conceptual frameworks and new analytical approaches.

This study will mainly focus on the use of ethnographic research tools and techniques as well as wider analysis of policy documentation. The process and the PhD thesis itself will also be translated and presented in an innovative way to help a wide range of expert or non-expert actors and will be communicated at a later stage. The intention is to help in the development of more effective policies, programs and future decision making and will benefit a wide range of actors, including practitioners, donor agencies, NGOs and local and international policy makers in achieving the SDGs in 2030.

Network

This research has a strong resonance with ongoing research amongst the Low Carbon Energy for Development Network (LCEDN) group and includes the Renewable Energy and Decentralization (READ) project on decentralization and energy governance as well as new interests in clean cooking through the Modern Energy Cooking Services (MECS) programme.