ECOINDUS

ECOINDUS analyses the ecological transition of the gas industry by questioning its low-carbon promises in the biogas and hydrogen industries, its regional variations in France and the public policies that support them. Based on a comparative survey of the biogas and hydrogen industries in Bretagne and Nouvelle Aquitaine, we will attempt to determine whether the gas industry is genuinely making a transition, including not only decarbonisation but also democratisation of decision-making and territorialisation of projects (their integration into a specific social and eco-system). Two main assumptions guide the research: that power relationships in the conventional gas industry are reproduced in the biogas and hydrogen industries; that transition provides an opportunity for subversion of the dominant model at the local scale depending on the capacity of local coalitions of actors to seize the existing political instruments. Analysing how low-carbon policies and projects in the gas industry are built, ECOINDUS stresses the ability of incumbent energy companies to translate into acceptable terms the government injunction to move towards carbon neutrality. Studying the relationships between cross-sectoral ecological transition policies, the gas industry and the areas where the projects are located, ECOINDUS highlights the new local political capacities offered by the ecological transition to redefine, not only a local variety of transition adapted to the legacies of the territories and greater participation of citizens in energy issues, but also the relevant scale at which the transition is debated. The contribution of ECOINDUS is threefold. Empirically, the project will provide new data about the ecological transition in the gas industry, which has not been investigated in the case of France. Analytically, it develops our understanding of the political impacts of ecological transition policies on local dynamics and industrial organisation. Theoretically, it extends the framework of the institutional order towards the political work of policy solution building and the local scale of the government of an industry