Renewable energy expansion or the preservation of national energy sovereignty? Norwegian renewable energy policy meets resource nationalism

Abstract

Proponents of renewable energy often argue that renewables bolster national energy sovereignty. Most of the scholarship however focuses on security of supply, imports and enhanced domestic production, not on exports. How does exporting renewable energy resources affect sovereignty? Here, we turn our attention to Norway, a country that is already self-sufficient in renewables, and where renewable energy expansion is primarily directed at exports. Drawing on resource nationalist scholarship we empirically scrutinize key Norwegian renewable energy debates and show how the Norwegian renewable energy debates do not include notions of renewables bolstering sovereignty. On the contrary, they vary between portraying the relationship between renewables and sovereignty as a non-relationship, where renewables are immaterial to sovereignty, or an adverse relationship, where renewable expansion is perceived to weaken, rather than strengthen, sovereignty. The fear of being locked into an asymmetric dependency relationship with an EU that gradually wrests away Norwegian sovereignty over natural resources triggers resource nationalist imaginaries and is a powerful brake on renewable energy expansion. Resource nationalism is also fueled by claims of green grabbing and attacks on local self-determination. Our findings signal that renewable expansion may trigger political and popular backlashes, and that resource nationalist claims about abstained sovereignty may constitute considerable obstacles to renewable energy transitions.