Project Leader
Dr. Marie Claire Brisbois is the Principal Investigator of the Powershifts Project. She is a Lecturer/Assistant Professor in Energy Policy at SPRU (Science Policy Research Unit) at the University of Sussex, and Co-Director of the Sussex Energy Group. Dr. Brisbois’ research focuses on energy, climate and environmental governance, collaboration, and water systems science. She has worked as a European Union Horizon2020 Marie Curie Research Fellow in the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development at Utrecht University, and as a Mitacs Science Policy Fellow within the Canadian federal government at Natural Resources Canada. Her academic background includes a PhD in Social and Ecological Sustainability from the University of Waterloo, a Masters of Applied Science in Biological Engineering from Dalhousie University, and a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science from York University. She has also held an Adjunct Professorship from the University of Waterloo. Her professional activities include various consulting positions addressing issues of water, climate and human health.
Collaborators
Prof. Rob Raven was the initial Supervising Scientist on the Powershifts project. Previously a professor in ‘Institutions and Societal Transitions’ in the Innovation Studies department of Utrecht University, Prof. Raven is now the Deputy Director of Research at the Monash Sustainable Development Institute. His interests are in sustainability transitions and socio-technical innovation. Dr. Raven made major contributions to multi-level theories of transformative change, the notion of socio-technical experimentation and to the governance perspective of strategic niche management. His empirical work has covered energy and mobility transition processes in both Europe and Asia. He published over 50 scientific articles on these topics and has edited special issues in Research Policy, Technological Forecasting & Social Change and Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions. He won the EASST Chris Freeman award for a significant collective contribution to the interaction of science and technology studies with the study of innovation. His current research agenda is focused on analysis of transformative change in urban contexts such as eco-cities and smart cities. A key question is how socio-technical experimentation, institutional change and path-dependant urban regimes co-produce the future of cities world-wide.
Dr. Agni Kalfagianni is Tenured Associate Professor of Transnational
Sustainability Governance at the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development. She specializes in the development of rules and standards for sustainability by non-state actors, such as businesses and civil society organisations, and examines the effectiveness, legitimacy, and ethical and justice considerations of private and transnational forms of governance. Her main empirical domains are food and agriculture, the food-energy nexus, and marine governance. Agni is (co)Editor-in-Chief of the Global Environmental Governance book series by Routledge, and member of the Editorial Board of International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics and Agriculture and Human Values journals. Her work has appeared in numerous international peer-reviewed journals including Global Environmental Change, Journal of Business Ethics, Globalizations, and edited volumes with major university presses, such as the MIT Press.
Research Team
Duncan Edmondson is a doctoral candidate in Science and Technology 
Policy at SPRU, University of Sussex. Duncan has a background in Environmental Science (BSc; University of Leeds – School of Earth and Environment), and previously completed an MSc at SPRU in Energy Policy for Sustainability. During his MSc, he undertook a project researching Legitimacy in Technological Innovation Systems, applied empirically to the offshore wind sector in the UK. Duncan’s current research engages with the politics of transitions, and the co-evolutionary dynamics of policy mixes and socio-technical systems. Empirically, the research analyses energy efficiency and micro-generation in new build domestic housing.
Wouter Kersten
completed his Masters of Sustainable Development at Utrecht University, specializing in earth system governance. His research focused on explaining power dynamics in the net-metering energy policy arena in the Netherlands. He did so by identifying and analysing discursive shifts in the policy making process based on an extensive qualitative literature review. Wouter is currently preparing this material for publication.
POWERSHIFTS 