Dealing with Carbon: Environmental Policy, Organizations, and Technological Responses to Climate Change

This dissertation examines three interconnected dimensions of environmental governance: how contested technologies gain policy legitimacy, how entrepreneurs construct and moralize new environmental markets, and how expertise shapes American energy policy discourse. Through mixed-methods research including computational analysis of Senate communications (2000-2023), interviews with industry stakeholders, and analysis of policy hearings, I reveal the long-term institutional and narrative processes underlying technological responses to climate challenges. The first paper documents fundamental shifts in American energy policy deliberations, tracking the increasing influence of business interests and changing patterns of expertise in Senate hearings. My analysis reveals how partisan priorities shape which problems receive attention and how institutional constraints determine which voices dominate policy discourse. The second paper introduces "insulated consensus” technologies, demonstrating how certain solutions persist not through effectiveness but through alignment with dominant political narratives about technological innovation. Carbon capture exemplifies how technologies that preserve existing infrastructures receive disproportionate support regardless of outcomes. Together, these papers contribute to an understanding of current policy and the actions of market actors related to addressing environmental issues challenges. The third paper investigates entrepreneurial efforts to establish carbon markets, showing how startups navigate moral tensions while creating new commodities from environmental problems. Through interviews with 17 industry actors, I reveal how entrepreneurs constitute emergent markets through cultural classifications that justify their work despite technological uncertainties and opposition.

Department dc:contributor.department

Sociology

Year dc:date.issued

2025

Author dc:creator

• Gherghina, Mircea

Advisors dc:contributor.advisor

• Hoffman, Steve
• Dokshin, Fedor

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/1807/150347

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:utoronto.scholaris.ca:1807/150347