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Many energy projects exist 'on the edge', suspended between promise and abandonment, between vision and the actual infrastructure. Because of this, energy transitions can propel communities into a new future and at the same time disrupt livelihoods, identities, and relationships with the landscape.

Typically these major undertakings are also played out in the peripheries, located away from corporate boards and centres of consumption, leaving local communities to carry a disproportionate share of the material, environmental and social costs of energy production. On the other hand, people living here often come up with new ideas that can shape more just and sustainable ways forward.

The authors of On the edge of change examine the conditions for, effects of and reactions to energy transitions in peripheral regions in Sweden, Norway, Finland, Greenland, and the Faroe Islands. By analysing the energy transition processes with perspectives drawn from the humanities and social science, they give fresh insights into green investment, colonial legacies, and contested futures.