Context

This international exchange aims to explore links between urbanisation, sustainable energy and health in the Amazon.

Dr Paola Santana is a geographer at the Federal University of Amazonas (UFAM) in Manaus. A specialist in urban geography, she coordinates the Núcleo de Estudos e Pesquisas das Cidades na Amazônia Brasileira (Centre for Research on Cities and Urbanization in the Brazilian Amazon – NEPECAB).

Our exchange will build on NEPECAB’s extensive research on the growth riverine urbanization in the Brazilian Amazon. We will draw on Santana and her colleagues’ expertise, along with Kirshner’s work on low-carbon energy for development, to examine links between urbanisation, emerging clean and renewable energy systems, and their broader effects on human health and wellbeing in the region. This collaboration will build a multi-institutional network to foster a new research agenda on energy geographies in the urbanising Amazon, including the impacts of electricity and clean cooking access on the lives of residents. It will also engage with YESI’s research theme of Environment and Health.

Aims and Objectives

This collaboration aims to build a multi-institutional network to foster a new research agenda on the institutional and geographic study of energy transition in urbanising areas of the Amazon, including the impacts of electricity and clean cooking access on the lives of residents. Further, it will contribute to YESI’s research theme on Environment and Health.

The focus will be on the Manaus urban region and interior cities of Amazonas state. During the visits:

  • We will develop a review paper that integrates studies of urbanisation, electrification, energy resources and human development in the Brazilian Amazon.
  • We will identify agencies to target for grant funding to further develop this work with ethnographic evidence and empirical case studies.
  • We will hold a one-day workshop at UFAM on energy, urbanization and natural resources in Amazonas, inviting presentations from colleagues with related expertise.
  • Site visits are envisioned to observe isolated energy systems in certain locations (e.g., Itacoatiara), a gas pipeline, and other features of the energy landscape.

Outputs

YESI International Fellows Seminar: The production of urban space in Amazonas state, Brazil.