The CCIT holds a Seminar Series, with monthly talks, where we invite exciting scholars from around Denmark and beyond to present their ongoing research at the intersection of Climate and IT. Our goal is to select speakers that might be interesting to the interdisciplinary audience that the CCIT provides and to stimulate conversations on the myriad of different ways in which climate and digital technologies are intertwined.

Our talks will take place at ITU and on Teams between 12-13h, so bring your lunch and get inspired.

The talks are open to students, staff or interested actors from outside ITU. No registration is required.

CCIT Seminar with Mei-Huan Chen on environmental monitoring and ecological containment

Abstract:

Governing the fluid land-sea border: Smooth Cordgrass, Environmental Monitoring, and Ecological Containment in the Kinmen Islands

This presentation examines efforts to monitor and contain smooth cordgrass as a form of environmental and border governance. It pays particular attention to how monitoring technologies and practices seek to render the plant’s distribution visible and actionable. It highlights three sets of challenges that constrain these efforts: the plant’s mobility and underground reproductive capacity, which exceed territorially based forms of control; the fluid materiality of the intertidal zone, where tides, saltwater, and mud constrain access, monitoring, and removal operations; and the limited technical and financial resources on the islands that hinder operating capacity. Drawing on more-than-human and volumetric perspectives on environmental and border governance, the presentation argues that governing and monitoring cordgrass requires recurrent intervention in a fluid and volumetric environment shaped by multiple materialities and institutional conditions. The case thus shows the limits of technologies and territorially based governance in rendering dynamic ecological processes fully visible and controllable. 

Bio

Mei-Huan Chen received their PhD in Geography from the Pennsylvania State University. Their research examines the politics of environmental governance and infrastructure, with particular attention to island and coastal environments. Their work has explored how geopolitics, island environments, nonhumans, and development politics shape water governance and infrastructure on the Kinmen Islands. Their current research looks at invasive species governance and coastal transformation, as well as the history of Taiwan's distant-water fisheries.

When: September 25th 2026, from 11:00-12:00

Where: 3A08 or online via this Teams link (Meeting ID: 367 168 754 399 098, Passcode: KB6PS6Hm)

CCIT Seminar with Jutta Haider and colleagues on Green Teaming AI

On October 5th, we look forward to a CCIT seminar with visiting professor, Jutta Haider. Jutta Haider is joined by her colleagues to present and discuss their project Green Teaming AI.

Abstract:

Towards Green Teaming AI: Eliciting and problematising ‘the (missing) environment’ in GenAI

The Green Teaming AI project develops methodological concepts and analytical devices, to 'test' and critique the ways in which ‘the environment’ is represented, rendered, and prefigured (or fails to be so) in GenAI.

While the proliferation of commercial GenAI applications and the hyperscaling of data centers has brought the environmental harms of these technologies into sharper focus, most notably their unsustainable resource use and energy demands, direct environmental impacts of the material infrastructure are not the only way in which the environment and GenAI interrelate. Although indirect environmental impacts and underlying values and assumptions are harder to identify, they remain highly consequential and should be made visible. The project engages diverse stakeholders and raises public and research awareness of GenAI’s indirect environmental effects and develops Green Teaming AI as a participatory approach to address environmental concerns.

Green Teaming AI draws inspiration from the method of ‘red teaming’ AI. Red teaming is typically conducted in technology companies to identify unintended, unsafe, and harmful outcomes of AI models. Inadequate industry disclosure of the data, algorithms, design decisions, and business interests underlying consumer-facing GenAI applications often hinders recognition and ultimately the regulation of their shaping environmental values. Therefore, new methods and community-based approaches to examine how this occurs and what effects it has on environmental communication, governance and meaning-making are needed.

The Greenteaming AI project is broadly informed by new materialism and digital STS. Throughout the course of the project, a set of co-creative workshops are arranged with diverse participants across Sweden. Each workshop focuses on specific contexts of human-environment interactions or sites of environmental meaning-making. Examples include, but are not limited to, economy, ecology, marketing, nature conservation, forestry, and tourism.

The project is part of the MISTRA Environmental Communication (2019-2027) programme.

Project team consists of:

• Björn Ekström, Senior lecturer and researcher in Information Studies at the Swedish School of Library and Information Science (SSLIS), University of Borås
• Jutta Haider, Professor in Information Studies at the Swedish School of Library and Information Science (SSLIS), University of Borås, and visiting researcher at CCIT (Mistra Fellow)
• Malte Rödl, Associate Professor in Environmental Communication at SLU, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences.
• James White, Postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Technology and Society, Lund University, Sweden

When: October 5th 2026, from 12:00-13:00

Where: 2A08 or online via this Teams link (Meeting ID: 347 793 239 860 511, Passcode: eK6Cb9wq)

Image credit: Lone Thomasky & Bits&Bäume / https://betterimagesofai.org / https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

CCIT seminar with Luis Landa on ITUs solar server

We look forward to the next CCIT seminar where Luis Landa will update us on the operation of ITUs solar server. His talk is titled "ITU's Solar Server and Energy Limited Computing Environments for Education: An Update and Reflecting on 1 year of operation".

Luis works as Research Assistant (among other part-time positions) at the DASYA Lab at ITU, where his work focuses on the set-up, maintenance, and development of tools for the solar server project at ITU. He also works on the software radio for the DISCO2 satellite. For a long time, he has been interested in the practical side of deploying low-tech solutions and creating direct democratic decision making around IT infrastructures. Currently, Luis is exploring the possibility of writing a PhD on network sovereignty and local network communities.

Abstract:

This talk centers on ITU's solar server initiative, reflecting on the practical work involved in setting it up, developing tools for the server, maintaining it, and interfacing with students and staff about its potential use. It has been nearly 1 year since https://solar.itu.dk has gone live and since then we have obtained different sensor measurements that allowed us to understand how viable this project could be as a teaching infrastructure. This infrastructure, unlike most of ITU's IT infrastructure, would not depend on Big Tech and could serve as an experimental ground for how an independent and sovereign IT could work for a small university in Denmark. Based on our sensor data, and following conversations with students and colleagues, we now know that the project is theoretically viable for some workflows, however, certain upgrades are necessary to meet some minimum requirements for professional use.

While the technical work continues, many questions remain unanswered which you are invited to come and discuss at this talk:

• What role can such infrastructure play in an university that educates professionals for the IT industry?
• What competencies are needed to administer and develop these infrastructures?
• Who gets to "spec" such a system? What (if anything) is done differently during this process?
• How can/Should we balance the need for cutting-edge research with the constraints of sustainable computing?
• How do we deal with shifting baselines and imaginaries of what a "decent" enough computer is?

During the talk, I will present a status update, showcase the data we have collected and present my reflections during this process.

When: May 11th 2026, from 12:00-13:00.

Where: At ITU in room 3A08, or online via Teams by following this link (Meeting ID: 347 041 638 290 39, Passcode: RV3AM6oR)

CCIT seminar with Martin Tremčinský on blockchain as a lineage mode of production

We’re excited to welcome Martin Tremčinský for a talk and discussion. Martin Tremčinský is a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Sociology, Czech Academy of Sciences. His research explores the digital economy, particularly its socio-technical imaginaries and their impact on social structures. Previously, Martin examined these themes through the lens of the Czech and Slovak Bitcoin communities. His current work focuses on the effects of digital economies in the context of the energy transition.

Abstract:

Picture credit: Colourbox/ Tawan Chaisom

CCIT Seminar with Jeff Diamanti: Supply Chain Ecologies

We’re excited to welcome Associate Professor Jeff Diamanti (University of Amsterdam) for a talk and discussion. Jeff Diamanti is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Cultural Analysis at the University of Amsterdam and Professor of Global History of Sustainable Development at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (by special appointment). For over a decade he has researched and written on logistical cartographies, energy infrastructure, and political ecology. His first book, Climate and Capital in the Age of Petroleum: Locating Terminal Landscapes (Bloomsbury 2021) tracks the political and media ecology of fossil fuels across the extractive and logistical spaces that connect remote territories like Greenland to the economies of North America and Western Europe. His new research, Bloom Ecologies, follows the mining of phosphorous in the occupied Western Sahara to the aquatic currents forcing algal bloom and hypoxic milieu all over the planet. He is also building a long-term research network on Supply Chain Criticism to document and evaluate the conflicts implied by the EUs Critical Raw Materials framework.


Abstract:
From where will the resources summoned for the “twin transition” originate and on what terms of deliberation? What are the political ecologies and cultural inheritances conditioning the future of sustainable development in the European Union? This talk will introduce the field of “supply chain criticism” and offer a number of case studies for our collective consideration, with emphasis on phosphorous, nickel, and copper.

Where: 3A08 or online via this link (meeting ID: 310 956 105 481 8 /password: 7iR6wk6N)

When: March 26th from 12.00-13.00

Picture credits: Matthew de Livera

CCIT Seminar with Lampros Lamprinakis on cooperatives in digitalized governance

We are excited to welcome Lampros Lamprinakis for a talk. In his talk, “Cooperatives as Naturally Embedded Organizations: Lessons for Democratic Governance, Resilience, and Participatory Transformation in Digitalized Governance Systems and Beyond”, he explores how cooperatives function as participatory, human-centered governance models that embed ethical business practices, foster organizational resilience through cognitive and institutional adaptation, and navigate policy shifts - parallels that extend to digital platforms, welfare technologies, and sustainable innovation in public and civil society contexts. Lampros has a diverse background across different countries and industries, and holds a position as a research scientist at NIBIO, the Norwegian Institute of Bioeconomy Research. His recent work builds on previous research on industrial organization (I/O), cognitive dissonance, and mental frames to explore circular business practices, sustainable value chains and up/re-cycling, through the lens of mixed methods (e.g., theoretical models, sentiment analysis, etc.).

Abstract:

What really differentiates cooperatives (coops) from other organizational forms (e.g., volunteer organizations, non-profits, Investor-Owned-Firms/IOFs, etc.), and how these differences manifest themselves in terms of strategy and conduct? How embeddedness à la Polanyi fits with the coop organizational structure and what it entails for coop resilience, but also market performance and communities? We will also explore how core insights from this work can be extended to emerging domains where digital technologies increasingly mediate or reshape how social, organizational, and natural resources are governed; applying cooperative-inspired principles (e.g., shared decision-making, community embeddedness, and adaptive governance) as conceptual analogies or transferable frameworks to design more equitable, democratic, and sustainable digital governance systems – e.g., citizen-involved digital platforms, welfare technologies, or bioeconomy value chains augmented by digital tools, thus fostering responsible innovation that respects planetary boundaries and enhances societal wellbeing. His talk partly draws from his article “Co-operatives as Naturally Embedded Organisations and Implications for their Resilience” (Journal of Co-operative Studies).

Where: in 3A08 or online via this link (meeting ID: 356 902 475 622 25 / password: Sr3vc7Rb)

When: April 10th from 10.00-11.00

Picture credits: Alicia Mary Smith

CCIT Seminar with Cornelius Heimstädt on 'The Climatization of Venture Capital'

On March 12th, Cornelius Heimstädt invites us for a discussion on the role of venture capital in the climate crisis in his talk ‘The Climatization of Venture Capital’. Cornelius is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Hamburg. He is a sociologist whose research lies at the intersection of economic sociology, environmental sociology, and Science and Technology Studies (STS). His work focuses on how private companies engage with questions of sustainability. He has examined how so-called “agtech” start-ups transform agricultural markets and societal conceptions of sustainability. At the University of Hamburg, Heimstädt leads the DFG-funded project The Climatization of Venture Capital: Transformations of Financial Expertise, Valuation, and Performances, which investigates the emerging field of “climate venture capital” in Germany and is affiliated as an Associate Researcher with the Cluster of Excellence “Climate, Climatic Change, and Society” (CLICCS).


Abstract:
Venture capital (VC) occupies an ambivalent position in the climate crisis. Long associated with scaling carbon-intensive industries, it is now increasingly celebrated as a key lever for financing climate solutions. This talk introduces my new DFG-funded research project, carried out at the University of Hamburg, which conceptualizes this shift as the climatization of venture capital: a process through which VC firms reconfigure their expertise, valuation practices, and public performances in response to climate change. Empirically, the project focuses on venture capital markets in Germany and their ties to broader European policy and innovation arenas, examining the period from 2015 to the present and thereby covering both the rapid expansion of “climate tech” investing following the Paris Agreement and its more recent slowdown amid geopolitical tensions, rising interest rates, and an intensifying global climate backlash. Rather than treating venture capitalists simply as financial intermediaries constrained by fiduciary logics, the project examines how they actively reposition themselves as credible and authoritative climate actors, asking: How do VCs integrate climate concerns into their knowledge and valuation practices, and how does this shape their role in the financialization of climate change?

When: March 12th 13.00-14.00

Where: 3A08 or online via this link (meeting ID: 336 359 705 163 2 //password: D4Rv6SB3) 

Picture credits: Anne Nygard

CCIT Seminar on predictive models, climate futures and divination

On February 20^th from 12-13h we are joined by Asmus Rungby and Kristian Hoeck (Dept of Anthropology, KU), who are discussing predictive computational modelling of climate futures in their talk titled ‘Oracular modelling: predictive models and anthropocene divination’. Asmus and Kristian are both postdoctoral researchers. Asmus’ work centers around  governance and political economy of green transition and democracy in southeast Asia, whilst Kristian’s work focuses on the ways in which humans engage with robotic and humanoid technologies.

Abstract:

Based on ethnographic fieldwork in both the Danish Meteorological Institute (DMI) and the Asean Centre for Energy (ACE) we interrogate the role of computational modelling in  institutional responses to climate futures. Drawing on the ethnographic literature on divination and oracular practices we reframe the utility of predictive modelling results from determinative truth claims about the future to efficacious warnings. We draw on contemporary theorizations of speech acts to itemize pivotal factors for the efficaciousness of oracular modelling results into four felicity concerns: Political purity, productive uncertainty, institutional connectivity and technical fidelity. Through a series of ethnographic illustrations we will argue for the continued salience of the anthropology of divination in understanding the social authority and impact of predictive computational modelling in institutional settings.

When: Feb 20th, from 12.00-13.00

Where: in 2A08 or online via this link (meeting ID: 348 388 828 821 23/ password: gG2LC95z)

Picture credits: Logan Voss

CCIT Seminar with Farley Nobre on AI and SDGs

On Monday January 26th from 12-13h, we’re joined by visiting professor Farley Nobre for our first CCIT Seminar of 2026. His talk, titled Artificial Intelligence and the Sustainable Development Goals: Understanding Tensions and Synergies Across North–South will deal with questions of global inequality and climate change in the age of AI. Farley Nobre is a professor leading AI and Sustainable Systems at the Graduate Program in Business Administration at the Federal University of Paraná (BR). His Ph.D. thesis from the University of Birmingham (2005), “On Cognitive Machines in Organizations,” is a groundbreaking work that advances the theory and practice of AI in management and organization research. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1595-8903

Abstract

This seminar explores the boundaries among artificial intelligence (AI), business, and society from a systemic and paradoxical perspective, emphasizing their implications for grand challenges related to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It investigates how SDG interactions shape regional priorities, generating tensions and opportunities, thereby supporting policymaking and global sustainability transitions amid AI systems and deep uncertainty.

Where: 3A08 or online via this link (meeting ID: 336 767 163 056 59/password: ja6zG3n3)

When: January 16th from 12-13h

Picture credits: John Cameron

CCIT Seminar with Miguel Sicart on play at the end of a World

On November 18th, Prof. Miguel Sicart will present some thoughts on play in the climate crisis in his talk 'Play at the end of a World'. Join us for an interesting discussion, and bring your own thoughts and experiences! Miguel Sicart is a Professor of Digital Play at the Play, Culture, and AI section of the IT University of Copenhagen, who, as a games scholar, has studied the ethics of games, the role of play in computational culture, and the ridiculousness of software. His research can be found in ridiculous.software and miguelsicart.net.


Abstract:

What is, and what could be the role of playing in the current and future worlds shaped by the climate and energy crisis? In this talk, I analyze the role of play during the climate catastrophe, and will imagine what type of play we will need when this world ends and others substitute it.

Where: 3A08 or online via this link (meeting ID: 364 018 946 662 8 // password: wX7xF7D4)

When: Nov 18th from 12.00-13.00

Image credits: Logan Voss

CCIT Seminar with Sebastian Prost on digital acroecology

On November 6th we are joined by Sebastian Prost (University of London), who will give a talk titled ‘Digital Agroecology: Agri-Tech between Grassroots and Capitalism’. Sebastian is a Lecturer at the Centre for HCI Design at City St George’s, University of London, working in the intersection of food and technology, where they explore responsible socio-digital innovations with local food networks and smallholder farms. They are interested in questions of sustainability, social justice, more-than-human design, and building long-term community relationships through participatory design.



Abstract:
Digital technologies in agriculture are typically portrayed as enabling more sustainable production while increasing productivity. Yet, commercial solutions rarely address the root causes of unsustainable farming, preventing more radical solutions such as agroecology taking root. In this talk, I will present findings from fieldwork with 11 small-scale agroecological farms investigating their adoption of digital technologies. Far from being anti-technological, colleagues and I found instead that current digital tools poorly support farmers' work with nature. Further, the collaborative nature of agroecological farming, market productivity pressures, and regulatory requirements necessitate complex data practices for coordination, planning, monitoring, and learning. These data practices require labour that is often hidden and causes tension within farms. Based on these insights, I will present guiding principles for designing digital technologies appropriate for agroecology and suggest concrete design opportunities. More broadly, I present a call to reimage digital agriculture beyond capitalism and work with existing farmer-led grassroots networks towards technological sovereignty.

When: November 6th from 12.00-13.00

Where: in 2A08 or online via this link (meeting ID: 312 534 408 738 5 // password: jJ7Gt73t)

Picture credits: Zoe Schaeffer

CCIT Seminar with Marianna Fenzi on the Green Revolution

On October 31^st,we’re joined by Dr. Marianna Fenzi for a talk titled "Beyond the Epics of the Green Revolution: Internal Critiques and Alternative Visions”. Marianna Fenzi is a social scientist with a PhD in History of Science and Science and Technology Studies (STS). Alongside her historical research, she has conducted ethnographic and ethnobotanical studies at the French National Institute for Agronomic Research (INRAE), Biodiversity International, and the University of California, Berkeley. She is currently a Research Fellow at the Institute of Geography and Sustainability at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland. Her work combines archival research and socio-historical analysis with field investigations. She focuses on the history of the Green Revolution, international agricultural research, and crop diversity conservation. Her main interest lies in how farmers manage crop diversity and how these practices intersect with scientific approaches, debates, and narratives on agricultural transformation in both the Global South and North.

Abstract

The Green Revolution has often been portrayed, both by its promoters and by many social scientists, as a homogenizing force, whose innovations were expected to displace all alternatives. Without denying its transformative effects, this paper seeks to move beyond the epic narrative of agricultural modernization to uncover the continuities, tensions, and plural trajectories that shaped it. Drawing inspiration from Dipesh Chakrabarty’s call to “provincialize Europe,” I examine the Mexican Agricultural Program (MAP, 1943 -1965), launched by the Rockefeller Foundation as the first large-scale experiment in international agricultural development. Based on archival research and ethnographic fieldwork, this study explores how the MAP became both a site of scientific experimentation and political negotiation. The program, centered on hybrid maize dissemination and germplasm collection, was seen by the Rockefeller Foundation as a vector of progress capable of transforming rural societies without recourse to socialist reform. Similarly, for the Mexican state, agricultural modernization offered a way to depoliticize agrarian reform through technoscientific solutions. Rather than depicting Mexican scientists as passive “recipients” or U.S. experts as mere “missionaries,” I show how both groups faced the failure of hybrid maize to fulfill its promises, prompting debates over alternative approaches to crop improvement. These controversies reveal the unfinished and contested nature of the early Green Revolution.

In a second part, I shift attention to farmers, moving beyond their portrayal as “the dominated” to explore the pragmatic choices guiding their seed management. Drawing on my ethnographic and ethnoecological research in Yucatán, I show how local seed systems continue to underpin maize production in Mexico, sustaining agrobiodiversity through community seed exchange and adaptive strategies, even after climatic shocks. These findings illustrate that peasant practices remain central to the ongoing evolution of maize diversity - beyond modernist dichotomies of “primitive” versus “modern” varieties. Ultimately, “provincializing” the Green Revolution means not only exposing its limits but also recognizing the multiplicity of situated practices, values, and knowledges that have continuously redefined the relationship between science, agriculture, and society.

When: Oct 31st from 12.00-13.00

Where: 4A20 or online via this link (meeting ID: 324 951 782 591 // password:sq7VL7wN)

 Picture credits: James Baltz

CCIT Seminar on Producing carbon integrity with Barbara Moraes

Please be invited to our seminar on the financialization of forest conservation in the Amazon, where we are joined by Barbara Moraes, a PhD Fellow at the Anthropology department at the National Museum, part of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. Barbara's talk is titled: Producing carbon integrity: financialization of forest conservation in the Brazilian Amazon

Abstract:

In the aftermath of controversies involving land grabbing, fraudulent contracts, and phantom credits, integrity has emerged as a central value invoked by entrepreneurs, certifiers, and financial actors as a means of resolving the so-called carbon credit crisis. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork following a forest-based carbon project in the Amazonas state, this presentation explores how integrity is enacted as a set of techniques for managing community expectations, cultivating territorial presence, and aligning with global standards and financial classifications. From local negotiations in riverine communities to global debates over certification methodologies, standards and market transparency, integrity emerges as a multi-scalar practice that simultaneously builds business opportunities and reshapes the moral landscapes of conservation practices.

This research is being funded through the Dissertation Fieldwork Grant from the Wenner-Gren Foundation. 

Where: 2A08 or online via this link (meeting ID: 381 474 336 108 2/ password: Bp62ja7J)

When: Sept 30th from 12:00-13:00

Picture credits: gustavo nacht

CCIT Seminar with Kari Marie Nørgaard

On September 23rd from 12-13h, we welcome Prof. Kari Marie Nørgaard for a talk titled “Climate Denial and Beyond: Learning from Cultures of Climate Responsibility”.

Dr. Kari Marie Norgaard is Professor of Sociology at University of Oregon and affiliate faculty in Environmental Studies and Indigenous, Race and Ethnic Studies. Dr. Norgaard is a leading environmental sociologist, known internationally for her work on climate denial and environmental justice. She is the author of over three dozen articles and book chapters in the areas of environmental sociology, climate change, Indigenous environmental justice, gender and environment, and sociology of emotions including Salmon and Acorns Feed Our People: Nature, Colonialism and Social Action(Rutgers University Press, 2019) and Living in Denial: Climate Change, Emotions and Everyday Life (MIT Press, 2011). Dr. Norgaard Chaired the Section on Environmental Sociology of the American Sociological Association from 2018-2019 and is a founding member and Secretary/Treasurer of the ASA Section on Indigenous Peoples and Native Nations. She has worked as a consultant for the Karuk Tribe on climate adaptation and tribal environmental policy since 2003.

Abstract:

The changing climate is rapidly altering the biophysical systems around which our modern capitalist societies are organized, and upon which existing life forms depend. Yet despite urgent warnings from atmospheric and social scientists, human social and political response to climate change remain wholly inadequate. Together, these facts constitute an unfathomable crisis. My first book Living in Denial: Climate change, emotions and everyday life describes how privileged people collectively resist integrating information about climate change into daily life due to a desire to avoid thinking about this highly disturbing topic. I call this collective phenomenon the social organization of climate denial and describe how denial is produced across societal levels of micro, meso and macro. The framework of climate denial shifts our approach to climate engagement from an “information deficit” model in which a more informed public would be the necessary ingredient for climate action. But if climate apathy is a function of socially organized denial, how do we break this cycle? At the same time as I was writing Living in Denial, I began working on a seemingly very different issue -- climate policy work on behalf of the Karuk Tribe, the second largest Native American Tribe in California. I first began drawing parallels between these projects in a series of public talks starting in 2021 in which I noted the contrast between climate denial in privileged communities, and the very extensive climate engagement of my Karuk colleagues. Climate change is a profound existential threat for all of us, so what makes climate engagement in some communities possible, while hindering it in others? Indigenous peoples have been on the forefront of climate engagement across the board from social movements to legal action, policy frameworks and more. Are there aspects of Indigenous engagement that hold broader teachings on climate mobilization? I became interested in the role of culture, and specifically how culture can mobilize and inhibit climate engagement. Many cultures and traditions have practices about collective responsibility that could be usefully applied to a climate context. This talk will introduce the framework of socially organized denial, explore the role of culture and the development of a sociological imagination as potential ingredients for climate engagement.

When: September 23rd, from 12.00-13.00

Where: in 3A08 or online via this link (Meeting ID: 381 486 990 225 8/ password: DT6ra3DK)

CCIT Seminar with Barbara Abrahao

On september 10th, we host Barbara Stiubiener Abrahao, PhD candidate at Oxford University, for a talk titled '800 Cuambas Monkeys!?” - Permanence and Transformations in a Quilombo-led Carbon Credit Project'

Barbara is a PhD candidate at the School of Anthropology and Museum Ethnography at the University of Oxford. Her ethnography lies at the intersection of economic and environmental anthropology, and the studies of Lowland South America. She describe the world encounter between a quilombola community and a company producing carbon credits, exploring the ambiguities and multilayered entanglements of capitalism and the climate crisis. The stories she tells delve into the complex interactions linking financial actors with scientific rationalities, vernacular knowledge, enchanted creatures, nonhuman animals, and the gardening practices of quilombolas.


Abstract:
My presentation is based on an eighteen-month ethnography in a quilombo community of the Brazilian Amazonia which engages with a consultancy and an investment bank in developing a carbon credit project. The story I tell revolves around a number that haunted me during months of fieldwork. The number, which refered to the amount of Cumbas monkeys quilombolas hunted every year, arose from a misundardstanding about what ‘caring for the forest’ might mean for quilombolas, on the one hand, and the financiers on the other. Behind this number, assumptions from financiers about quilombolas’ relationships with money and labour turned the future into a site of dispute. Anticipatory feelings and activities created both potential benefits and 'disasters' following carbon production. Financial actors’ practices are guided by perceptions of financial risks, shaped by market contexts and assumptions related to race. This is ambiguous, as it influences investors’ expectations about profitability but also adds value to carbon bonds by promising social and environmental change for quilombolas and their forests. In paralel, quilombolas’ engagement with the carbon economy draw on their nostalgia for a traditional past of abundance and their quest for autonomy. Quilombolas hoped to use carbon to perpetuate their mode of life while radically improving their welfare conditions —a process I describe as domesticating carbon. My interlocutors’ expectations and fears about their commitments reveal the differing understandings and values, including financial ones, attached to transformation.

Where: 2A08 or online via this link (meeting ID: 324 036 807 293 5 /password: vW2Yr3yp)

When: September 10th, from 12-13h.

CCIT Seminar: Explorations in Climate Sound and Society

The Center for Climate IT and AIRLab are excited to co-host Kara Oehler and Jesse Shapins, Co-Founders of the Institute for Climate Sound & Society (ICSS) for a talk titled ‘Explorations in Climate Sound & Society’. Started at metaLAB(at)Harvard University and now taking root in Copenhagen, the Institute brings together sound-based practices entangled with the climate crisis, offering new ways to sonically gather, analyze and represent data to understand changing biodiversity and ecosystems. Merging the rapidly evolving landscape of sound recording technologies such as passive acoustic monitoring and AI with long-established audio recording methods, climate sound integrates work from scientists, technologists, artists, journalists, scholars, and policymakers across bioacoustics, soundscape ecology, atmospheric science, geology, STS, media theory, landscape architecture, conservation, finance, music, and many other arenas. The Institute for Climate Sound & Society supports this growing community and is engaged in innovative research, publishing, and gatherings with the mission to advance new forms of knowledge and expand research impact. The talk introduces the Institute, presents some reflections on the role of sound and ‘sensory’ climate data and concludes with a discussion where there will be space for questions and further reflections.

Where? 3A07 or online via this link (meeting ID: 359 880 398 117 2 / password: VR6YS3Mb)

When? 12/06 from 12 – 13h

Picture credits: Oleksandr Horbach

CCIT Seminar with Guilherme Cavalcante and Priscila Santos da Costa

On May 20th, the CCIT welcomes Guilherme Cavalcante and Priscila Santos da Costa to give a talk titled The Amazon as a technology incubator: AI, smart city, and a new technopolitical regime in Canaã dos Carajás.

Guilherme Cavalcante Silva (he/him) is a PhD candidate in the Graduate Program of Science & Technology Studies at York University, Canada, bu tis currently visiting at the University of Geneva. His current research focuses on the intersections between science and technology policy and development frameworks in Latin America, with focus on Brazil. Besides his current interests, Guilherme has navigated through fields such as critical data studies, philosophy of technology, and political communication throughout his career, always concerned with the political, social, and economic implications of technological development.

Priscila is an Assistant Professor here at ITU. She is part of the Amazônia 4.0 project, where she studies how how green transitions can be implemented in practice and what role(s) new technologies may play in this regard. 

Abstract: 

Technocratic imaginaries of the Amazon are not new, The use and appropriation of technologies have long been tied to both the economic exploitation of the region and the idea of ‘modernizing’ Brazil. However, linking these imaginaries to green growth and sustainability is a more recent development. This talk will reflect on the construction of the Brazilian Amazon as a ‘connected’ and innovation-oriented region through the meeting of two technological visions: on one side, the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) and the smart city agenda as tools for building Brazil’s international technological profile; and on the other, the case of Canaã dos Carajás, a small city in the state of Pará, located 750 km from Belém (which will host COP30 in 2025), and home to the world’s largest iron ore mine. This 30-year-old city, which saw its population and GDP per capita surge after the mine’s discovery, has become the site of one of Brazil’s first AI-oriented smart city initiatives (project).

By tracing the framing of Canaã dos Carajás as a smart city and unpacking the AI imaginaries tied to national public initiatives, this presentation (based on work currently in progress) explores the narratives that reimagine the Amazon as a technological incubator.

When? May 20th from 12-13h

Where? in 2A50, or online via this link (meeting ID: 318 279 573 921/ password: MY9Ff3J4)

Picture credits: Juan Orestes

CCIT Seminar with Melissa Gregg: Computing after Carbon

On May 2nd, we will be joined by Prof. Melissa Gregg for a talk titled 'Computing after Carbon'. Melissa is an author, ethnographer and sustainability consultant focused on design and engineering initiatives to address climate change. Her research provides guidance on carbon emissions reduction, circular economy, nature-based thinking and Green UX. She is an advisor on sustainability strategy at Meta Reality Labs and Professor of Digital Futures at the University of Bristol Business School. She is also active in land and bird conservation in her home state of lutruwita/Tasmania.

Abstract:

As tech companies emerged from COVID-19, a supercharged hype-cycle focused on advancements in AI took the place of worries about return to work mandates and employees "quiet quitting." Facing scrutiny from boards and investors looking for a reliable return on investment, companies claiming to be at the forefront of progressive action on climate took an axe to their workforce, using AI competitiveness as the excuse. In so doing, some of the biggest high-tech employers lost a generation of leaders with the skills and experience to influence companies towards alternatives to personal computing paradigms inherited from the fossil-fuel era. All the while, carbon emissions from AI workloads appeared poised to place Net Zero commitments worldwide at risk.
Learning from these stories, which includes first-hand experience, this talk explores some of the limitations in sustainability strategy in corporate IT, and the challenges that the new US administration poses to climate action. It also shares positive examples of individuals and groups building alternative means to scale low carbon computing to unsettle business as usual.

When: May 2nd from 10-11.30

Where: AUD 4 or online via this link (meeting ID: 334 481 717 781/ password: Z7dw6Jt6)

Picture credits: USGS

CCIT Seminar with Neil Selwyn: Digital Degrowth ... perhaps *not* the worst idea on the planet?

On April 24th, about a month before his book 'Digital Degrowth' comes out, we are joined by Professor Neil Selwyn (Monash University, Lund University) for a talk titled "Digital degrowth ... perhaps *not* the worst idea on the planet?" Coming from the tech Education angle, Neil has for the past 30 years researched the integration of digital technology into schools, universities and adult learning. He is recognised as a leading international researcher in the area of digital education and is currently working on nationally-funded projects examining the roll-out of educational data and learning analytics, AI technologies, and the changing nature of teachers' digital work.

Abstract:

In 2020, Wired magazine declared degrowth to be ‘the worst idea on the planet’. Three years later, Marc Andreessen called out degrowth as a ‘bad idea’ and an ‘enemy’ to technological progress. Taking inspiration from Andrew Ahern’s observation that ‘degrowth pisses off all the right people’, Neil Selwyn considers what degrowth and post-growth thinking might have to offer those looking to radically break away from the destructive modes of digital excess that have come to define the first few decades of the twenty-first century. In short, this talk considers a deceptively simple question – how might degrowth thinking support ambitions of sustainable, scaled-down and equitable ways of living with digital technologies?

After first sketching out what a philosophy of digital degrowth might look like, this talk will lay out various instances where alternate post-capitalist forms of digital technology are already being realized around the world. It also highlights a range of emerging ideas, innovations and experiments that point to possible future forms of ‘radically sustainable computing’. While we should not be naive about the difficulties of any such change, Neil concludes that solid foundations already are in place from which to establish digital degrowth as a social movement that is locally determined and aligned with a wider societal decoupling from economic growth and capitalist imperatives.

Where: AUD 3 and online via this link (Meeting ID: 338 965 341 88 / password: pE79Gg7g)
When: April 24th from 12.00 – 13.00

Image credits: United States Geographical Survey

CCIT Seminar with Prof. Tilmann Rabl: Ecological Efficiency in Database Servers

On March 20th, we are joined by Prof Tilmann Rabl, a professor for database systems at the Hasso Plattner Institute and the University of Potsdam, Germany for the talk: Ecological Efficiency in Database Servers. His research focuses on data processing and management in large scale systems, on modern hardware, and in streaming applications. Besides efficiency improvements, he is interested in making systems and applications friendlier for the environment and society in general.

Abstract:
For the longest time, acquiring new hardware resulted in significant software efficiency gains due to exponential improvements of hardware capabilities. Physical limits in hardware manufacturing have brought former niche designs into standard components, such as multiple cores and specialized circuits. Even with these new designs, hardware improvements are decreasing, while software and applications are still becoming increasingly complex and resource demanding. This trend is pronounced for database systems, which are not the major target for current hardware optimizations.
In this talk, we will discuss hardware and cloud trends and their ecological impact. We will introduce ecological efficiency of database system deployments. We will discuss hardware trends and their impact on database systems. We will look at our research on the design of efficient software architectures and give an outlook on our vision of holistically optimizing the ecological efficiency of database deployments.

Where: 2A08 and online via this link (Meeting ID: 356 576 531 302 / password: Pv6KF6WX)

When: March 20th from 12.00-13.00

Picture credits: Vick Taylor

CCIT Seminar: Embracing the Ambivalent Green Transition

In March, the CCIT will be visited by the brilliant Megan Maurer, who is currently an Assistant Professor at the Department of Geosciences and Natural Resource Management (KU). She will dive into the fractured nature of experiences around urban nature and nature-bases solutions (NBS) with a talk titled ‘Embracing the Ambivalent Green Transition’. A cultural anthropologist by training, she is interested in interdisciplinary examinations of the relationships among people and plants in cities.

Abstract:

We face inter-related crises of climate change, biodiversity loss, and increasing urbanisation and inequality that require immediate action. Nature-based solutions (NBS) offer key contributions to urban green transitions while fitting neatly within existing governance regimes aimed at optimising performance via data-driven technological / infrastructural interventions. As ever more sophisticated forms of data collection and assessment are being used to guide urban NBS planning, design, and implementation, these interventions face resistance from urban residents due to social unacceptability and unjust outcomes, troubling the prospect of an ‘optimal’ outcome. These challenges indicate needs for qualifying different types of data by engaging diverse values of nature and knowledge systems and accounting for the multivalent, lived experience of urban environments. Moreover, they reveal a gap in knowledge regarding the negative contributions of nature (e.g., ecosystems disservices, disvalues of nature)—in particular, how these can be described and assessed across different scales, and how they shape the formation of urban residents’ preferences and practices regarding urban nature and NBS. Drawing together on-going and prospective work in Copenhagen and New York City, I consider the role of spatial-qualitative and place-based methods for identifying ‘the bad things’ in urban nature and residents’ experiences of ambivalence, or the co-occurrence of both positive and negative nature perceptions and experiences. Furthermore, I discuss how the integration of these approaches with other forms of social, spatial, and ecological data through a social-ecological-technological systems analysis can reveal multi-scalar pathways of ambivalent value formation and their role in shaping urban nature preferences and practices. The goal of this analysis is two-fold: (1) to explore methodological possibilities for the integration of large-scale data, participatory digital methods, and ethnographic approaches in research for urban green transitions; and (2) to provide an empirical basis from which to propose a more socially acceptable and just approach to urban NBS planning, design, and management through prioritising living with ambivalence, rather than optimisation.

When? 14/3 from 12.00 – 13.00

Where? 3A08 and online via this link (meeting ID: 369 724 452 811/ password: uq3d4oM3)

Picture credits: Beeing

CCIT Seminar: Equity in Action’ or Equity Inaction? New Orleans, Digital Technology, and the United States’ National Flood Insurance Program

One more interesting seminar coming your way! On March 5^th from 14.00 – 15.00 we are joined by Martin Abott, who will present a talk titled ‘'Equity in Action’ or Equity Inaction? New Orleans, Digital Technology, and the United States’ National Flood Insurance Program, followed as always by a discussion. Martin is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Science and Technology Studies at Cornell University. His research is focused on how new and emerging technologies and environmental change intersect in the city. Martin holds a Master of Architecture from the University of Technology, Sydney, and a Master of Arts in Political Sociology from Sciences Po Paris.

Abstract:

In this talk, I examine how being flood smart and the notion of equity are reshaping the future of the United States’ National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP). After Hurricane Katrina, scholars showed that Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) disaster recovery programs favored white communities and deepened racial wealth gaps. To address this inequity, I take up calls to scrutinize the disproportionate impacts of flooding and planning mechanisms that perpetuate inequality. I argue that the label of ‘smart’ and digital technologies associated with it conceal, rather than confront, a long history of inequity in FEMA’s programs. In the NFIP, smartness is mobilized as a rhetorical practice to market and sell flood insurance. Recently, an emerging smart technology called “Risk Rating 2.0: Equity in Action” has transformed flood insurance pricing. While FEMA describes Risk Rating 2.0 as an engine of equity, I show how the rating methodology targets economic fairness only. Social and environmental equity, among other intersections of race, class, and gender, are not factored into the new pricing methodology’s algorithm. As emerging smart technologies reform the NFIP, being flood smart calls into question how and why flooding affects some people more than others.

Where? 2A08 or online via this link (Meeting ID: 358 158 928 651/ password: 6me9gW7L)

When? March 5^th from 14.00 – 15.00

Image credits: doosenwhacker

CCIT Seminar: Information Environmental Justice: Digital Infrastructures, Data ideologies and Transnational Activism

On Feb 27th, we are visited by Tim Schütz, who has agreed to give a talk whilst he is in town. Tim is a PhD student at University of California Irvine’s Department of Anthropology. Join us either online and offline for an interesting discussion!

Abstract:
In the face of escalating environmental crises, digital infrastructures are becoming critical sites of struggle, mediating how environmental harm is documented, contested, and governed. My research examines how activists, researchers, and affected communities leverage digital tools to counter corporate practices and state neglect in the petrochemical industry. Based on three years of multi-sited ethnographic research in the United States, Taiwan, and Vietnam, my talk explores the development of the Formosa Plastics Global Archive, a digital knowledge commons that supports transnational environmental justice movements. I trace how data ideologies—assumptions about what counts as legitimate knowledge—shape activist strategies and how digital infrastructures can both enable and constrain efforts to make environmental injustices visible. By situating these initiatives within broader debates on digital sustainability and environmental governance, I argue that digital infrastructures are not just technical artifacts but sites of political struggle that shape the possibilities for green transitions. I’ll share insights I’ve gained building the Formosa Plastics Global Archive, while also helping develop the Platform for Experimental Collaborative Ethnography (PECE), an open source platform designed by and for qualitative researchers. 

When? Feb 27^th from 10.00 -11.00

Where? 2A08 and online via this link (meeting ID: 358 384 152 998 / password: DS6bJ3Lz)

Photo credits: Nick Fewings

CCIT Seminar on the use of open source tools for land use and land cover change monitoring

Join us for a CCIT Seminar on land use change, where we are joined by Maria Sinziiana and two ITU alumni, Aske Meineche and Viktor Due. They present a paper that they have previously presented at the conference SIGSPATIAL in Atlanta, US.

Abstract

The availability of moderate and high-resolution satellite imagery collections and advancements in large scale cloud computing have created opportunities to develop globally consistent and near real time (NRT) land use and land cover (LULC) classification products. Such products have in turn facilitated the monitoring of land use and land cover change (LULCC) at a much larger scale than before. This is essential in understanding and analysing the competition for space in the context of a rapidly growing population, increasing standard of living, and a strained ecosystem. Several studies pointed towards inaccuracies and spatial and typology bias in LULC classification products. In this paper we investigate the feasibility of utilizing publicly available, pretrained models for LULCC analysis. We describe a framework for large scale analysis that allows incorporating diverse sources of data and we discuss a case study of quantifying LULCC driven by green energy infrastructure expansion. We introduce the concept of Rapid Change Sequences which can be used to improve classification accuracy. Lastly, we propose a method to produce vector embeddings of the LULC change graph, which is the first tool to allow cross country comparisons of land use change dynamics.

When? Feb 25th from 12.00-13.00

Where? 2A08 or online (Meeting ID: 373 365 939 245 / Password: kS92Xd7y)

Picture credits: Nicolas van Leekwijck

CCIT Seminar: Ekhilur and Money for Life

Time to discuss degrowth! Join us for this interesting seminar, where Florencia Radeljak, PhD student from the University of Lund, will present an ethnography of a local, digital money network in the Basque Country, Spain.

Abstract:

Actor Network Theory (ANT)-oriented scholars explore how associations evolve between material and semiotic elements in networks, but critical debates on digital money and sustainability show ANT fails to consider more political questions and a calls for collective action, understood as the project of assembling new entities not yet gathered (Latour, 2005). In the presentation I will explore what connections allow the enactment of degrowth principles in digital money. Degrowth is an economic, ecological and socio-cultural challenge decolonizing Western cultural representations of ‘growth’ and ‘development’, and the institutions, values and practices that derive from these cultural paradigms. I use concepts from ANT and Design for the Pluriverse to explore how a community in the Basque Country (Spain) is designing a digital payment system called Ekhilur, aimed at fostering a socio-ecological transition aligned with degrowth principles. Using a qualitative methodology that consisted of five days of participant observation and five in-deph interviews with the members of the system’s governing body, I identify the main characteristics of the digital money, and the connections between the different elements in the money network. I highlight the emergent processes of the system and reflect on the money’s digital nature in relation to the scalability of the project. The discussion contributes to the broader debate on the complex relationship between money, technology, and sustainability, emphasizing the importance of politicizing the networks that underpin digital money to advance a sustainability model centered on collective interests.

Where? 3A08 or online here (Meeting ID: 343 021 854 828/ Password: dH7XR3zB)

When? February 17th, 10.00 - 11.00

Picture credits: Nico Bermudez

CCIT Seminar: Valuing energy and nature in bureaucratic practice

Join us for our exciting Valentine's Day Seminar – Valuing energy and nature in bureaucratic practice – with Ask Johansen (AAU).

Ask is a Postdoc at the department of Sustainability and Planning at Aalborg University and has worked extensively on valuation with regards to the green transition.

Abstract:

To sufficiently respond to climate change and environmental degradation, governing bodies need to value natural resources and environments differently. This is a guiding intuition for my research on the role of the bureaucracy in 'green transitions'. In this talk I engage with how municipal and state bureaucracies experiment with formats for valuing nature. The notion of bureaucracy evokes a sense of rigidity, and scholars have in various ways described how decision making processes in many states are dominated by neoclassical economic reasoning. Such reasoning takes value as natural given and thus limits how bureaucracies may modify valuing practices. But bureaucracies in practice are also sites of continuous change, experimentation, and adaptation, where multiple voices and reasonings circulate. Drawing on ethnographic work in urban- and energy planning offices in Denmark, I describe how nature is valued differently through various tools such as energy system models, stakeholder consultation formats, spreadsheets, reports and policy documents, and GIS data. Taking bureaucratic practice as material, fluid, multiple, and deeply involved in the enactment of value, opens an interesting space for research on and intervention in how nature is valued -- but the intervention part is tricky! So I will end with some reflections on my limited successes in that regard and hope for an engaged discussion.

When? 14/2 from 12.00 – 13.00

Where? 3A08 or online via this link (meeting ID: 355 973 782 678 / password: F3Uo7vy6)

Picture Credits: Claus Jensen