Building back better? Reviewing scenarios of a decentralised post-war electricity system in Ukraine

In 1976, Amory Lovins suggested a distinction between hard and soft energy paths, referring to scenarios envisioning a future with varying degrees of (de-)centralisation. Almost half a century later, there are still diverging views as to whether the future of energy is going to be centralised or decentralised. An empirical context in which such competing visions are particularly present is Ukraine. With the current, highly centralised infrastructure severely damaged after the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine a variety of stakeholders have published documents outlining scenarios for the country’s future energy system. Reviewing 32 such scenarios allows us to disentangle the technological and organisational dimensions of (de-) centralisation and identify incoherences in how they are addressed in expert documents.