Centre for Climate and Energy Transformation (CET)
At CET we aim to produce actionable knowledge that can inform policy and practice about how to achieve rapid, just and deep transformation of society to mitigate climate change.

About the research centre
CET is an interdisciplinary research hub working on climate and energy transformation. The centre was launched in 2017 and is located within the Faculty of Social Sciences at UiB. CET is a collaboration between UiB, NORCE and the Norwegian School of Economics (NHH).
The centre has core funding from the Ministry of Education and Research and generates impactful research through a variety of externally funded projects.
We organise the Beyond Oil conference, network events and a range of seminars.
Actionable Knowledge for Transformation
Climate change is one of the greatest threats to life on our planet. Despite a growing focus on the problem, modern society is not currently on a path towards meeting the commitments of the Paris Agreement to limit warming to 1,5 degrees.
There is substantial knowledge concerning the behavioural changes, policies, energy infrastructures and technologies required to tackle climate change. Now is the time to prioritize action that sets fundamental change in motion.
At the Centre for Climate and Energy Transformation (CET), we think of such change as sustainability transformation. This is a deliberate process that alters the political, cultural, economic, and social characteristics of society in a way that makes us more sustainable. Transformation must be driven by a commitment to democracy and justice. As researchers, this means we must have an intentional approach to what we conduct research on, how we do that research and how we create impact.
Our graduates are making significant contributions in fields related to climate and sustainability, reflecting the centre's commitment to producing actionable knowledge.
CET Affiliation

Are you a researcher at UiB, NORCE or NHH working on climate and energy transformation? Becoming a CET Affiliate opens up networking and funding opportunities as well as being part of an interdisciplinary and dynamic research environment.
To fully understand the complexities of climate change we need the competence of multiple disciplines and different perspectives. Affiliates are an active part of the network, and are invited to seminars, workshops, and retreats. We believe that interdisciplinary collaboration makes it easier to contribute to societal impact. Our aim is to have members who we can engage with in discussions to strengthen our research, collaborate with in research proposals, as well as help us to improve our research questions and gain knowledge that is of use to society.
N.B. Please note that it is a requirement to be employed at one of our partner institutions (UiB, NORCE or NHH) to be eligible for CET affiliation.
Featured
Events
Projects
Research projects
Ongoing projects
BALTIC - Backlash to energy transition at three Baltic states
CIRCULAR - Collaborative innovation of circular economy
ECOBUDGETS - Actionable budgets for sustainable climate and nature
ECOLOGIC - The logic of measuring, managing and governing ecosystems
MANIFEST - MechANisms and actors of Feasible Energy Transitions
MUCS: Media Use in Crisis Situations
Research School: Empowered Futures
Completed projects
PhD projects
Postdoctoral projects
Communications projects
Publications
Academic publications 2024
Journal articles
Barquet, K., Morsut C., Rhinard M., Englund M., Mees H., Hegland Engen O.A., Neby S., Jochemsen N., and Angell E. 2024. “Variations of riskification: Climate change adaptation in four European cities.” Risk, Hazards, & Crisis in Public Policy 15(4): 491-517.
Biely,K., Sareen, S., de Vries, G., Chappin, E., Bauwens, T., Montagnino, F.M. (2024) Understanding the embeddedness of individuals within the larger system to support energy transition, Sustainability Science.
Børhaug, K., & Neby, S. 2024. “Politisk handlingskompetanse for berekraftig utvikling.” Nordidactica: Journal of Humanities and Social Science Education 14(2): 88-109.
Das, A., Cordoba, D., Kristiansen, S., Velardi, S., Wonneberger, A., Yamaguchi, T., and Selfa, T. 2024. «Sociotechnical imaginaries of gene editing in food and agriculture: A comparative content analysis of mass media in the United States, New Zealand, Japan, the Netherlands, and Canada.” Public Understanding of Science 0(0).
Girard, B., and Sareen, S., 2024. “Change everything so that (almost) nothing changes? Investigating the territorial distribution of solar energy subsidies in rural India.” Environmental sociology 10(4): 385-396.
Girard, B., Shokrgozar, S., and Sareen, S. 2024. “Governing renewable energy rollouts in financially constrained contexts.” Renewable and Sustainable Energy Transition, 100086.
Girard, B., Shokrgozar, S., and Sareen, S. 2024. “The meaning of solar energy: Political imaginaries of solar energy in contemporary India.” Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space.
Gregersen, T., Doran, R., Ogunbode, C.A., Böhm, G. (2024) How the public understands and reacts to the term "climate anxiety". Journal of Environmental Psychology.
Haarstad, H. (2024) Naturens møte med økonomien. Nytt Norsk Tidskrift.
Haarstad, H., Grandin, G., Solberg, R.R. (2024) Do cities have tools to meet their climate targets? The limits of soft governance in climate action plans. Cities.
Haarstad, H., Hofstad, H., Vedeld, T., Smas, L., Braathen, E., and Millstein, M. 2024. “Democratic limitations of urban climate governance: proactive and reactive citizen action in four Scandinavian cities.” Urban Geography: 1-19.
Haarstad, H., Rosales, R., and Shrestha, S. (2024) Freight Logistics and the city Urban Studies
Jewell, J. 2024. “Commentary on ‘the interplay of the innovation cycle, build time, lifetime, and deployment rate of new energy technologies: a case study of nuclear fusion energy’ designing innovation strategies for rapid feasible technological change.” Oxford Open Energy 3, oiae015.
Jewell, J., and Kazlou, T. 2024. “Major step up in carbon capture and storage needed to keep warming below 2 °C.” Nature Climate Change 14: 1022–1023.
Kazlou, T., Cherp, A., and Jewell, J. 2024. “Feasible deployment of carbon capture and storage and the requirements of climate targets.” Nature Climate Change 14: 1047–1055.
Kristiansen, S. (2024). Can Information Change People's Mind? An Autoethnographic Reflection on my Personal Journey to Veganism. Environmental Communication.
Mahoney, K., Lopes, R., Sareen, S., Gouveia, J.P(2024) Perceptions of competing agendas in carbon neutrality policies in Portugal: Adverse impacts on vulnerable population groups Energy Research & Social Science
Morsut, C., Engen O.A., Neby S., and Angell E. 2024. “Translations of Climate Change Consequences at the Local Level: Climate Change Adaptation in Bergen and Stavanger Municipalities in Norway.” Risk, Hazards, & Crisis in Public Policy 15(4): 468-490.
Müller, A., Sareen, S. (2024) The maintenance of carbonscapes: Enacting Net Zero in Stavanger, Norway. Geoforum.
Nacke, L., Vinichenko, V., Cherp, A., Jakhmola, A., and Jewell, J. 2024. “Compensating affected parties necessary for rapid coal phase-out but expensive if extended to major emitters.” Nature Communications 15, 3742.
Puig, D. 2024. “The Omiwatari Religious Ritual: An Example of Climate Change-Driven Loss of Intangible Cultural Heritage.” Case Studies in the Environment 8 (1): 2323147
Rajah, J.K., Atkins, A.E.P., Tang, C., Bax, K., Wilkerson, B., Fernald, A.G. et al. 2024. “Understanding hydrologic, human, and climate system feedback loops: results of a participatory modeling workshop.” Water 16(3): 396.
Rommetveit, K., Ballo, I.F., and Sareen, S., 2024. “Extracting users: Regimes of engagement in Norwegian smart electricity transition.” Science, Technology, & Human Values 49(3): 472-499.
Rosales, R. 2024. “Is it enough to enable freight? Modes of governance for urban logistics in Norway.” European Planning Studies 32(12): 2473–2492.
Sareen, S., (2024) Leisure mobility: Situating emotional geographies of friluftsliv in urban mobility transitions. Emotion, Space and Society, 50, 101003.
Sareen, S. (2024) Financially-constrained solar development: A comparative analysis of urban fabrics and scalar expression in Portugal and Rajasthan, Energy Research & Social Science.
Sareen, S., Haarstad, H., Gong, H., Aiken, G., Skjølsvold, T. M., Silvester, B. R., Popovic-Neuber, J., Stopa, M., Lindkvist, M., Pezzotta, M., Sasse, L., Shokrgozar, S., Haugland, B. T., Langhelle, O., & Inderberg, T. H. J. 2024. “Watt sense of community? A human geography agenda on energy communities.” Progress in Environmental Geography 3(4): 289-310.
Schrage, J., and Haarstad, H. 2024. “How is feasibility in local climate politics constructed? Balancing between appropriateness and consequence in advancing urban low-carbon plans.” Journal of Environmental Policy & Planning 26 (6): 643-655.
Schrage, J., Haarstad, H., and Hidle, K. 2024. “The strategic value of contradictions: exploring the practices of climate planning in Bergen, Norway.” Journal of Environmental Planning and Management 67(14): 3626-3644.
Shokrgozar, S., Remme, D., Stock, R. (2024) “We Have to Convince Them Whatever it Takes:” The Climate Necropolitics of Energy Transitions in India and Zambia, Geoforum
Shokrgozar, S. & Girard, B., (2024) The companies are powerful, people are weak": India's solar energy ambitions and the legitimation of dispossession in Rajasthan, Journal of Political Ecology 31(1), 48–66.
Shrestha, S., Haarstad, H. and Rosales,R. (2024) Power in urban logistics: A comparative analysis of networks and policymaking in logistics sustainability governance Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions.
Shrestha, S. 2024. “Reconciling conflicting sustainability rationalities: a co-creation approach in urban logistics governance.” Sustainability Science 19: 1847-1864.
Stock, R., and Sareen, S., 2024. “Solar aporias: On precarity and praxis in interdisciplinary research on solar energy.” Energy Research & Social Science, 116, 103661.
Suzuki, M., Jewell, J., and Cherp, A. 2024. “Have climate policies accelerated energy transitions? Historical evolution of electricity mix in the G7 and the EU compared to net-zero targets.” Energy Research and Social Science, 106.
Theeuwes, N. J. J., Shokrgozar, S., and Ahonen, V. L. 2024. “Academic travel from above and below: Institutions, ideas, and interests shaping contemporary practices.” Energy Research & Social Science, 119.
Tråsavik, H.S., Loe, M.R., King, K., and Sareen, S., 2024. “Leisure mobility: Situating emotional geographies of friluftsliv in urban mobility transitions.” Emotion, Space and Society 50, 101003.
Yazar, M. (2024) Episodic populist backlashes against urban climate actions Urban Studies
Yazar, M., Daloglu, I., and Baykal, E. 2024. “The nested hierarchy of urban vulnerability within land use policies fails to address climate injustices in Turkey.” Environmental Policy & Planning 26(1): 30-46
Yazar, M., Fide, E.C., Cetinkaya, I.D (2024) The nested hierarchy of urban vulnerability within land use policies fails to address climate injustices in Turkey
Books & Book chapters:
Langhelle, O., Sareen, S., Silvester, B.R. (2024) From CCS to CCU and CCUS - the pitfalls of utilisation and storage. In Ø. Stokke & E.M. Oftedal (Eds.) Making CO2 a Resource. The interplay Between research, innovation and industry. Routledge.
Sareen, S. The Sun Also Rises in Portugal: Ambitions of Just Solar Energy Transitions.
Sareen, S., Martin, A.(ed) (2024) Geographies of Solar Energy Transitions. Conflicts, controversies and cognate aspects
Sareen, S. 2024. “Comparative visual ethnographies of the ensconcement of solar photovoltaics in the urban built environment of solar cities Jaipur and Lisbon.” Pp. 81-96 in Geographies of Solar Energy Transitions: Conflicts, controversies and cognate aspects, eds. S. Sareen and A. Martin London: UCL Press.
Sareen, S. and Martin, A., 2024. “Cognate aspects of solar energy transitions.” Pp. 1-22 in Geographies of Solar Energy Transitions: Conflicts, controversies and cognate aspects, eds. S. Sareen and A. Martin. London: UCL Press.
Media Publications 2024
People
Centre manager
Håvard Haarstad Centre Director
Centre management
Nora Haukali Research co-ordinator
Judith L. Reczek Dalsgård Communications manager
Researchers at CET
Silje Kristiansen Associate Professor
Simon Neby Professor
Daniel Puig Postdoctoral fellow
David Weinreich Postdoctoral Fellow
Mahir Yazar Postdoctoral Fellow
Ingrid Cardoso Couto de Azevedo PhD Candidate
Janne Bjørgan PhD Candidate
Agnete Hessevik PhD Candidate
Christine van der Horst PhD Candidate
Hanif Kawousi PhD Candidate
Tsimafei Kazlou PhD Candidate
Devyn Helen Avhild Remme PhD Candidate
Ida Kvilhaug Sekanina PhD Candidate
Shayan Shokrgozar PhD Candidate
Kjersti Sollund PhD Candidate
CET Affiliates
Peter Andersen Associate Professor
Lukas Bayer PhD Candidate
Marianna Betti Postdoctoral Fellow
Anand Bhopal Postdoctoral Fellow
Thea Gregersen Senior researcher, NORCE
CET Steerings group
Siri Gloppen Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences
Ingrid Helgøy Deputy EVP Health & Social Sciences, NORCE
Peter Andersen Head of Department, Dept. of Geography, UiB
Ståle Knudsen Professor, Dept. of Social Anthropology, UiB
Kikki Kleiven Director of Bjerknes Centre, UiB
Malin Arve Vice Rektor for Research, NHH
Contact
Visiting address:
Christies gt 18, 4th floor,
5007 Bergen