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Paper short abstract:

Dynamic of commoning-decommoning processes in two cases of establishing nuclear power plant construction in Poland reveals the human-environment relations behind these attempts, and the dynamics of social processes of acceptance of the nuclear power plant project, in the context of climate change.

Paper long abstract:

In the context of climate change (IPCC 2021), the transition from fossil fuel-based energy production to carbon-free sources is particularly important (COP26). Nuclear power is one of the possible solutions to consider as a zero-emission energy source. This presentation compares approaches to energy policy emerging from the policy makers' narratives justifying the construction of a nuclear power plant in Poland - in the case of the '80s’ Żarnowiec power plant and the current attempt - to show the commoning-decommoning change dynamics over the years.

The first nuclear power plant project was initiated in the '80s in the socialist People’s Republic of Poland and was intended to demonstrate the technological capabilities of the Communist regime. However, after the political transformation in Poland in 1989, the Polish authorities decided to stop the construction and abandon the project as unprofitable. Since then, the national policy has shifted to support distributed production. The current government is seeking to revive the idea of building a nuclear power plant in Poland at a similar scale and in the same location. However, its rationale is the need to reduce CO2 emissions and introduce more pro-environmental technologies to balance off and stabilize energy production from distributed renewables (Brook & Bradshaw 2014) in a more sustainable way.

This presentation aims to analyze the change in human-environment relations by evaluating the three stages of polish energy policies as commoning-decommoning dynamics based on discourse analysis of narratives from materials collected in research carried out under the Polish Ministry of Science Grant.