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Wesleyan University

Publication Date

Spring 2024

Program Name

Iceland: Climate Change and The Arctic

Abstract

Iceland’s government intends to achieve carbon neutrality by 2040, aiming to target various economic sectors and industries for increased renewable-energy usage. One of its most important plans revolves renewable-energy usage in the fishing industry, which accounts for almost 12% of the country’s GHG emissions. This study aims to understand the perspectives of different stakeholders concerning renewable energy in the fishing industry, using these opinions and existing literature to provide recommendations for a just, equitable, and achievable energy transition. Additionally, this study particularly focuses on the opinions of actors in Vestmannaeyjar, an island community of 4,300 with an especially vibrant, significant, and energy-intensive fishing sector. Through interviews with fifteen stakeholders involved in all levels of Vestmannaeyjar’s fishing industry, as well as complementary data from a survey conducted in 2023 on Icelandic small-scale fisheries’ (SSFs) responses to renewable-energy usage, this project illustrates the importance of financial, technological, and political barriers to fisheries’ adoption of renewable energy and the divides between SSFs and large, industrial fisheries concerning knowledge-sharing, ecosystem management, and Iceland’s individual transferrable quota (ITQ) system. Using this data, this paper then provides recommendations for encouraging renewable-energy usage in the fishing industry – including financial incentives, mechanisms for greater inclusion of stakeholders in the policy process, and the transformation of practices and behaviors regarding energy usage.

Disciplines

Agricultural and Resource Economics | Aquaculture and Fisheries | Climate | Oil, Gas, and Energy | Regional Economics | Social Justice | Sustainability

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