Landscapes of Decarbonization

PhD Dissertation
Department of Geography, University of British Columbia
2017 - 2022

This project examines visualizations of hydropower and hydraulic fracturing in northeastern British Columbia. Once considered peripheral, BC’s northeast has become a focal point for debates concerning decarbonization, economic development, and the role of infrastructure to mediate conflicting cultural and ecological values.

Through my research, I investigate how visualizations are used to legitimize and justify infrastructural interventions in a landscape. In the case of northeastern BC, these infrastructures are framed as a way to mitigate economic and environmental risks, but instead often serve to facilitate capital accumulation, colonial dispossession of Indigenous land, and the enclosure and commodification of life. I explore these themes through discourses of vulnerability and risk; the material and discursive production of wastelands and sacrifice zones; and the voyeuristic tendencies of digital landscape representation.

This project is supported by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) and the Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship.