Dartmouth Events

Camillo Stubenberg, PhD student at Cornell University, will give a talk titled "Does Grid Collapse Accelerate the Energy Transition? Lessons from Lebanon’s Electricity Crisis."

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About the Talk
In June 2022, a staggering 150,000 tons of solar panels arrived at the port of Beirut—equating to more solar capacity than Lebanon had imported over the preceding decade. Once lagging behind Mediterranean counterparts, Lebanon's energy landscape transformed rapidly due to the 2021 economic crisis and subsequent severe fuel shortages. The nation's established power entities, including the state utility Electricité du Liban and the infamous generator mafia, found themselves incapacitated without fossil fuels. Drawing from recent dissertation fieldwork, Cornell’s Camillo Stubenberg will explore this swift transition to off-grid solar energy. Lebanon's experience serves as a compelling case study in a world where fossil fuel supply chains and centralized grids are increasingly fragile.

About the Speaker
Camillo Stubenberg is a PhD candidate in the Department of Global Development at Cornell University. His dissertation research examines the social aspects of the rushed transition towards off-grid solar energy in Lebanon. For his project “Under the Patronage of the Sun? the techno-politics of Lebanon’s solar energy boom” he recently completed 11 month of ethnographic field research. Prior to coming to Cornell, Camillo worked worked as a consultant in rural development and impact research in the tri-border region of Austria, Switzerland and Germany. He earned a B.Sc. in environmental resource management from the University of Applied life Sciences in Vienna, as well as a BA+MA degree in International Development at the University of Vienna.

About the Series
The New Energy: Conversations with Early-Career Energy Researchers series was created in 2020 to provide a platform to help advanced early-career energy and climate researchers share their research during a time when the pandemic prevented travel. The series has continued as an online opportunity to highlight some of the world's up-and-coming scholars in the energy and climate space.To learn more about the series and access videos of previous talks, visit dartgo.org/NewEnergy