As the research of the Energy in COVID-19 group progresses, I am beginning to take a deep interest in temporality as it concerns both the unfolding pandemic and responses to it. Though disasters are truly all about timing and time is a prominent focus in much of the disaster studies literature, it seems particularly salient here. Discourses around COVID-19 are suffuse with temporal references: infection rates, mutation rates, rates of recovery, the new normal, the global economic slow-down, "responding too late," "opening up too soon," returning fire/hurricane season, disrupted circadian rhythms, caretaker fatigue, quarantine dragging on, living in (Bill Murray's) groundhog day. To many, time in the pandemic appears discontinuous and contradictory. Or, better yet, pandemic time is like time out of sync. Things happen too fast in some places, too slow in others. Boredom mingles with anxiety.
In the electric utility world, our group aims to analyze how COVID's temporality is conflicting with that of the social and physical infrastructures that enable people's access to energy. This includes keep track of things like frequencies of outages as well as reports of increases in response times due to decreased staff and restricted movement. We are also noting how the crisis is precluding many of the daily coping strategies of limited-income communities who were already dealing with energy vulnerability (i.e. visiting friends or public spaces with AC during the heat of the day).
Beyond informal coping strategies, the extant social infrastructure of energy assistance is also strained by the pandemic's longevity. LIHEAP's energy assistance programs, which vary by state, were only designed to offer short-term assistance during "crisis seasons" (i.e. harsh summers and/or winters). Most are neither prepared nor funded well enough to offer assistance over the long term. The existence and duration of moratoriums on disconnections (as well as plans to recover their costs) also vary by state. Thus, as seasons continue to change while these moratoriums come to an end, we aim to create both a map and timeline of the shifting spatio-temporality of energy vulnerability taking shape across the US.
On the other hand, the crisis is also opening up the possibility of new energy futures. Many nations and states are shifting their attention from immediate emergency management to thinking about economic recovery. In the past, efforts to boost the economy would, by default, entail massive uptakes in carbon emissions. Today, however, the crash in oil and gas, which coincided the outbreak of COVID-19 has had deep and far reaching consequences and some experts are predicting that the combined stressors are such that the industry will not likely be able recover. In response, a number of prominent economists have generated Green-New-Deal-like recovery plans that have also been endorsed by international development agencies like the IEA and IMF. This new globalist turn toward sustainable recovery could signal a new imaginary for the planet's energy future.
Thus, in addition to thinking about the temporality of disasters (i.e. fast vs slow), this pandemic raises questions about how intersecting temporalities are also constitutive of the disaster. That is, how are the complex, multiple, and dynamic temporalities of COVID-19 entangling with and interrupting other cycles, rhythms, and rates of change? How is this engendering and compounding its disastrous effects? On the other hand, what opportunities has it created? How might the COVID-19 experience alter or shape new ideologies and phenomenologies of time or imaginaries of the future? What temporal sensibilities do we need to develop in order to cope with the new normal of the "post-COVID" world?
In Energy in COVID-19, we are focused on how these questions pertain to plans and practices for producing, distributing, and consuming energy and related services. However, I also hold that the "COVID moment" is opportune for a wider problematization of time and disaster in a more general sense, one that may have important implications for disaster studies and disaster governance in/of the Anthropocene.
