Walt Patterson, an Associate Fellow in the Energy, Environment and Development Programme at Chatham House in London, UK, and a Visiting Fellow at the University of Sussex, and Michel Bauwens contribute their ideas and perspectives on P2P infrastructures to Re-public’s special issue about P2P energy.

Patterson proposes that we refocus so-called ‘energy’ activities to shift the balance, away from supply of fuels and electricity toward upgrading the user-technology and user-infrastructure – especially buildings – that deliver the services we desire. At the moment that viewpoint is not represented strongly by any party anywhere on the political spectrum in democratic society anywhere. If we stop taking traditional electricity for granted, if we begin to examine and question it, we may come to prefer innovative electricity.

Bauwens takes a broader view and argues that the new economy will be an economy of renewable resources, that’s why access to land and soil will become one of the main sources of abundance again if it will be combined with access to new information technologies and information exchange. Countries with heavy exposure to solar input and large reserves of land and biomass will be particularly well placed in this transition.

All the articles can be found here.