Forward-looking network analysis of ongoing sustainability transitions

Abstract Experimentation with novel technologies mobilises resources and constructs expectations for systemic transition, yet there is limited research that examines large numbers of energy experiments. Our approach explores an idea of a patchwork of niches and contributes to transitions literature by looking beyond individual experiments. The analysis in this article identifies four clusters of sustainable energy networks (i.e. patchworks of niches), highlighting the roles of urban prosumption, rural production, small towns as integrators, and electric transport in the technological change in the Finnish energy system. The recognition of interconnections between technologies, settings and uses envisages the future scope of patchworks of regimes, and thereby provides an empirically founded, forward-looking knowledge base for political planning and development of social learning. The network analysis of the experiments was executed using Gephi visualisation and exploration software with a specific focus on energy technologies, energy sources, sites, forms of energy use and locality. A large Finnish database on sustainable energy experiments was used to identify and network connections between the core characteristics of such experiments.