Understanding the entrepreneurial process to adopt renewable energies in Sweden : a case study on an offshore wind park project in the Baltic Sea

Sammanfattning: The alarming magnitude of the global climate crisis is on the rise. Thus, a profound and rapid energy system transition towards renewable energies is needed. Offshore wind (OSW) parks are a promising energy source to boost green energy production. While OSW has been adopted in many European countries (e.g. Denmark and Germany), the uptake in Sweden is slow. Adopting large infrastructure projects (e.g. OSW) involve a plurality of actors who influence the adoption process. Studies that examine OSW adoption in Sweden emphasise the policy context for adoption (e.g. negotiating of a permit). Fewer studies consider the situation for entrepreneurs seeking to adopt OSW. Therefore, the paper focuses on the entrepreneurial planning process of adopting OSW in Sweden. Since the entrepreneur is one of many actors influencing the adoption of OSW, a governance perspective is applied to investigate the interplay of actors. The paper follows a case-study research design investigating a planned OSW park project in the Baltic Sea region close to the Archipelago of Stockholm. Primary data was collected through qualitative interviews with social actors involved in the case project. In addition, secondary data from documents, videos and webinars were collected to gain further insights. An in-depth frame analysis was conducted to analyse the interplay of multiple actors and their exercise of agency and power to influence the adoption of the case project. The group of identified actors was allocated to the following five actor constituencies: market, state, community, and the third sector. The actors used different modes of agency to influence the entrepreneurial process (support, collaboration, and communication). In conclusion, the study showed that the permit system is the prevailing regime that governs the adoption of OSW parks in Sweden. The entrepreneurial process to adopt OSW is complex. Thus, context (e.g. involved actors) is key to understanding the complexity of adopting renewable energies. Predefined models often do not address this context, making them difficult to apply to the adoption of large infrastructure projects (e.g. OSW park). Therefore, applying a governance perspective on the case project was helpful in creating context to understand the real-world conditions of adopting OSW parks in Sweden.