Infrastructures, lock-in, and sustainable urban development: the case of waste incineration in the Goteborg Metropolitan Area

Summary, in English

This article explains how infrastructures with a sustainability record may evolve over time into a lock-in that slows the emergence of more sustainable urban infrastructures. A study of waste incineration in the Goteborg Metropolitan Area, Sweden, serves as an illustrative case. Taking leads from Unruh (2000, 2002), four rationales of lock-in are identified in the case: institutional, technical, cultural, and material. The article describes how these rationales, one by one and in collaboration, lock-in waste handling in the Goteborg Metropolitan Area to incineration. The article also suggests that these four rationales could serve as a program to unlock urban infrastructures. Asking the question "Are we in a lock-in?" is featured as a practical starting point for planning changes in urban infrastructure governance that contribute to sustainability. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

• Author: Hervé Corvellec; Maria José Zapata Campos; Patrik Zapata
• Department/s: Department of Service Studies
• Publishing year: 2013
• Language: English
• Pages: 32-39
• Publication/Series: Journal of Cleaner Production
• Volume: 50
• Issue: 1
• Links: http://www.ism.lu.se/fileadmin/files/oki/Lock_in_WP.pdf; http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2012.12.009
• Document type: Journal article
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Topic: Social Sciences Interdisciplinary
• Keywords: Urban; Incineration; Waste management; Lock-in; Infrastructure; governance; Sweden; sustainability; waste
• Status: Published
• Project: Organizing critical infrastructure services-The case of Waste Management
• ISBN/ISSN/Other: ISSN: 0959-6526