Kjersti Aalbu is a PhD candidate at the Centre for Technology, Innovation and Culture (TIK). This seminar marks her midway evaluation.
About the project:
In April 2018, the International Maritime Organization (IMO), a UN specialized agency, adopted an ‘Initial Strategy’ for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from international shipping, including the ambition to reduce emissions by at least 50% by 2050 and to phase out emissions as soon as possible. This strategy presents a sea change in the global governance of greenhouse gas emissions from shipping, paving the way for the decarbonization of the sector.
The shipping industry is now grappling not only with demands to decarbonize and the search for solutions to achieve this, but also with digitalization processes that could change the shipping industry and may dramatically alter the production and transparency of knowledge about shipping activities. This period of change is characterized by an increasing dominance of data and expert knowledge in decision-making at the firm, national and international levels, and by the incorporation of new forms of expertise in the shipping industry. For example, the IMO’s Initial Strategy explicitly links the development of new regulations on greenhouse gases to the production of data from the newly developed IMO Data Collection System.
This project explores the role and politics of data in the decarbonization of international shipping, focusing on the development and implementation of the IMO’s greenhouse gas strategy. The primary objective of the project is to identify how different kinds of data are used as evidence in decision-making in decarbonization processes, and how data can support or prevent decarbonization at the speed and scale envisioned in the IMO strategy. A secondary objective is to identify how processes of digitalization are changing knowledge production processes and notions of expertise in the shipping industry in relation to decarbonization efforts.
The project is funded by DNV and the Norwegian Research Council through the industrial PhD scheme.
Thesis supervisors:
Susanne Bauer (TIK, UiO) – Main supervisor
Asun St.Clair (DNV) – Co-supervisor
Magnus S. Eide (DNV) – Co-supervisor
Commentators:
Erlend A. T. Hermansen (CICERO Center for International Climate Research)
Ana Delgado (TIK, UiO)
About Kjersti Aalbu
Kjersti Aalbu is a PhD candidate at the TIK Centre for Technology, Innovation and Culture at the University of Oslo and a senior researcher in DNV.
How to participate
The seminar will take place on Zoom and is open to everyone. The Zoom link and the manuscript are available upon request. Please send the request to TIK's Phd administrator (i.o.lien@tik.uio.no) and she will ask Aalbu to send it to you.
Welcome!