Models vs infrastructures? On the role of digital twins’ hype in anticipating the governance of the UK energy industry

Abstract

Scientists and practitioners working on digital twins promise to deliver replicas of the energy system and its components, able to automatically operate in real-time and generate countless scenarios to advise with planning of new infrastructures. Despite the enthusiasm across the industry, digital twins received criticisms for being mere empty buzzwords, unable to contribute to the ‘twin transition’ of digital and energy sectors. This article aims to understand the phenomenon of hype surrounding digital twins, treating it as an attempt to surface or conceal particular issues regarding energy governance. The analysis reveals that initially hype helped to enrol a broad community of stakeholders through the promises of detailed, real-time modelling, developed in tandem with responsible innovation tools for data scientists. Soon after, this framing brought about disappointment and confusion. With data access emerging as a key challenge, practitioners are re-aligning the agenda towards the creation of the infrastructure for data sharing. However, the debate on the ethics and politics of digital twins stayed with the initial framing of ‘digital twins-as-models’. In other words, the politics of data sharing were concealed. As such, digital twins require sociotechnical analysis beyond the modelling-specific concerns of bias, accuracy or explainability. Energy governance should focus instead on anticipating the reconfiguration of the political and economic relationships enabled by new data sharing infrastructures. The article concludes with identifying three governance concerns related to data sharing infrastructures in energy: 1) transparent procurement; 2) public engagement in grid upgrades; 3) sustainable financing of public IT projects.