For several years now, urban planning has incorporated environmental issues. In France, for example, Local Energy Plans, Energy Master Plans, and Climate Plans have been implemented by certain local authorities (Hinterberger, 2020).
These have become important in urban planning and the construction of the built environment for most cities in Europe.
However, their proponents find that they are not easily and quickly implemented in a practical and effective manner. This observation has been made and confirmed over several years. Feng et al. (2019) explain, using the example of 34 cities, that the number of net-zero energy buildings is lower than expected due to building codes and energy standards and the high initial cost, which is the main obstacle to implementation. Other studies conclude that most of these plans are highly dependent on the local context, with many pre-existing factors that are difficult to change (Ballesteros, 2013).
This leads us to look at what happens between planning and implementation: Why is there a lack of connection? Why are objectives, guidelines, and plans poorly translated into operational projects? How can these weaknesses be explained?
These frequently observed discrepancies have been the subject of scientific analysis but remain incompletely understood. Research has addressed this issue from various approaches: socio-technical (Geels, Kemp, 2007; McCauley, Stephens, 2012), organizational and institutional (Friedrichsen et al. 2014), and socio-political and legal (Bronin, 2010).
The main objective is to elucidate the reasons for the weak relationship between energy plan strategies and their implementation in reality, and the reasons for the slow pace of energy plan implementation and, in some cases, the failure and delay of certain projects during implementation.
The doctoral proposal is to carry out this analysis by observing the Segrtae project in Italy and other local situations in France.
Year of enrollment: 2022
Doctoral school: City, Transport, and Territories (VTT)