Net Zero Precincts stage 1 report: orienting
This first report from the Net Zero Precincts ARC Linkage project draws on over 50 interviews with participants living, working, commuting or connected to the Monash University Clayton Campus and the surrounding precinct to understand how everyday experiences, complications and possibilities are shaping net zero futures.
This report presents findings from the scoping and mapping stage of the project based on over 50 interviews with frontrunners and members of the precinct community. The report’s findings detail specific drivers and barriers to net zero, and draws on ethnographic research to identify everyday experiences of participants across the domains of energy, buildings, mobility, and data and automation.
The research reveals how the transition to net zero is complicated by potential tensions between infrastructure or technology-led visions and change initiatives and what people actually do in everyday life situations. The report provides real-life examples of existing transition activities and initiatives which demonstrate how ground-up change shaped by the everyday ingenuity and improvisation of people and communities who live, study and work in the precinct are already generating pathways towards net zero.
Ultimately, the project aims to develop and validate a new and transferrable approach for net-zero transitions informed by the real-life experiences of the precinct community and its businesses, government, knowledge sector and civil society actors. As such, it will provide significant benefits to organisations and individuals seeking to engage with and learn from everyday people about community needs and aspirations in accelerating urban transitions.
This first report reflects the 'orienting ' stage of the Net Zero Precincts Linkage project
The report was co-authored by Darren Sharp, Emma Quilty, Sarah Pink, Megan Farrelly, Sam Rye and Rob Raven.
Download the report [PDF]
About Net Zero Precincts Linkage project
Net Zero Precincts is a four-year ARC Linkage project that brings together two key areas of research for the first time – transition management and design anthropology – to develop a new interdisciplinary approach to transitioning urban environments to net zero at precinct scale. The project uses the Monash University Clayton Campus and Monash Technology Precinct as an action-oriented living lab to experiment, test and learn in a real-world setting.
Net Zero Precincts is led by Monash Sustainable Development Institute in collaboration with the Monash Emerging Technologies Research Lab, with an interdisciplinary team of researchers from Monash Sustainable Development Institute, Monash Art, Design and Architecture, Faculty of Information Technology and Faculty of Arts. Partners in the Linkage include ENGIE, the City of Monash, ICLEI Oceania, the CSIRO, the City of Greater Dandenong, Energy Efficiency Council and Swinburne University.