The system building perspective for building sustainable system configurations using the German energy transition as an example

Abstract

An increasing number of countries employ net-zero decarbonization targets in their climate policies, which requires decarbonizing socio-technical systems like the energy system by mid-century. While there is a high level of agreement about net-zero targets, there remains great uncertainty as to how to meet them. At the same time, the challenges of building a new system that fulfils systemic targets such as net-zero are insufficiently reflected on in the sustainability transitions literature. With the help of a literature review building on theories of socio-technical transitions, this paper introduces system building dimensions that account for the difficulties of net-zero transitions. We identify four such dimensions: (1) competing potential system configurations with different sustainability implications; (2) a broad range of complementary system elements needed; (3) lock-ins and path dependencies in the system building process; and (4) the politics of system building. We offer the German energy transition as an empirical case study to illustrate the relevance of these system building dimensions.