The Technological University of the Shannon (TUS) is organising the Online Workshop ‘Transdisciplinary Research in practice: Situated Energy Knowledges and “Polybrid Knowledge”’, on 16 April 2026.

This short course is grounded in Dr Eimear Heaslip’s doctoral research, Community Low Carbon Energy Transitions in Irish Islands: A Transdisciplinary Approach, and her subsequent conceptual development of Polybrid Knowledge.

Her PhD argued that low-carbon energy transitions cannot be understood purely as technical optimisation challenges. Drawing on social constructivism and post-normal science (Funtowicz & Ravetz, 1993), the research positioned energy as spatially and socially constructed (Calvert, 2015; Bridge et al., 2013) and embedded in everyday practices (Shove & Walker, 2014).

It further built on Donna Haraway’s (1988) concept of situated knowledge, arguing that place, peripherality, governance histories and lived experience shape island energy practices.

Methodologically, the research developed a transdisciplinary case study framework (Lang et al., 2012), combining qualitative methods, including problem-centred interviews (Witzel, 2000), focus groups and thematic analysis, with technical energy modelling (HOMER) to co-create low-carbon energy scenarios. The approach was informed by debates on co-production (Jasanoff, 2004), community knowledge networks (Catney et al., 2013), and communicative planning theory (Healey, 1998).

Building on this foundation, the session introduces the novel concept of Polybrid Knowledge. While earlier scholarship often framed planning as an interaction between “local” and “expert” knowledge (Nightingale, 2016; Nygren, 1999), Polybrid Knowledge shifts the analytical focus.

It argues that knowledge claims are not discrete categories that later interact but are already internally composite, shaped by disciplinary traditions, institutional logics, optimisation norms, identity formations, governance histories and socio-technical infrastructures before deliberation begins.