Environmental sousveillance, citizen science and smart grids

Abstract

Enhancing water, energy, transport and communication infrastructure through a distributed or centralised sentience-‘smart grids’-involves questions about power. Those questions are as much about data, knowledge and environmental activism as they are about technical protocols for internet refrigerators, congestion pricing of road networks and remote reading of domestic electricity meters. This chapter explores who gets to collect, access and use data from smart grids. It highlights emerging debate about privacy, including systemic surveillance by grid operators/partners, and security. It discusses scope for environmental mashups that inform public policymaking and environmental activism but conflict with legal frameworks for the ownership of data and quarantining of knowledge. It looks ahead to ask whether citizens can establish participatory environmental monitoring networks that are independent of grids operated by network providers such as power and water utilities.