Assetization by Kean Birch

Author:Kean Birch
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: How the asset—anything that can be controlled, traded, and capitalized as a revenue stream—has become the primary basis of technoscientific capitalism.
Publisher: MIT Press

Assetization and Financialization

With respect to the financial dimension, our case studies are also specific in two ways. First, because of FITs, there is no (or little) uncertainty as to the future revenue stream that can be derived from these projects once their initial development phase has begun and they have received the various administrative authorizations. So again, as opposed to studies of innovation-based start-ups (Doganova 2012, 2015), what entrepreneurs need to prove to investors is not that there is potential future value, but that they are able to access it—to get the construction permit and grid-connection authorization, to fund the installation of ReN production devices, and to site their project materially. The fact that the future value is defined by public policy to a certain extent alleviates the pressure of financial considerations on project development. Investors can still attempt to play with cost reduction or the scaling of the project in order to increase the project rate of return on investment (RRI), but there is no room or need for a race to the bottom on unit kWh remuneration, which limits the pressure on development costs.

Second, these case studies can be regarded as innovative ReN projects for France (Nadaï et al. 2014) in that they are based on the participation of politically engaged actors—the Figeac agricultural cooperative (mutualization, territorialization), the LPO (bird protection, environmental protection). In France, most wind power or PV solar projects are developed by private ReN developers. While developers need to take into account local configurations in order to get access to sun (roofs) or wind (site), profit-making and financial values tend to be more prevalent in project development processes than described here, with less attention and work devoted to the collective or environmental dimension of the projects (see Debourdeau 2011).

Hence, in both cases financialization is limited as a consequence (intended or unintended) of the design of the project. Entities—birds, roofs—are assessed, sorted, and aggregated, but only to a certain extent. While bird protection is reprocessed as to its risks, the gains that ensue from protecting (or not protecting) bird lives is not translated into financial terms nor even into monetary terms. Of course, there is a gain expected by the developer in collaborating in the processing of birds in relation to their risk—the gain in accessing the tariff by getting a construction permit for the wind farm. Yet the gains in protecting birds are not processed through financial calculation in terms of their amount: bird protection is not reprocessed as to its rewards.1

In Figeac, there is a pooling of roofs according both to the technical and geographical suitability of roofs as sites for photovoltaic electricity generation and to the contribution of individual farmers to the capital of the project. Holding shares and investing in the project was a requirement for participation, but while there was financial consideration of these investments and their expected yield, the pooling of the farmers’ collective and the roofs did not occur according to a computation of financial risk and reward (but

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