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A central challenge of the twenty-first century is to transition to a low-carbon energy system to reduce the risks of climate change. For Pima County, Arizona, where electricity accounts for the majority of greenhouse gas emissions, this requires rapid deployment of grid-tied renewable energy resources. In light of this challenge, photovoltaic solar has emerged as an important solution, providing the top source of new US electric generating capacity installed in 2016. However, there is still no consensus about the optimal scale for solar (centralized power plants, or small, decentralized systems) and the socio-economic implications for low income households. This thesis explores the implications of rooftop solar for energy justice through empirical research about a southern Arizona electric utility rate case. Utilities argue that existing rate structures shift costs from solar owners to lower-income ratepayers, while critics say the utility's proposed rate changes are unjust and that rooftop solar benefits all ratepayers. Drawing on my empirical data and an urban political ecology (UPE) approach, I analyze competing narratives that speak to three types of justice: distributive, procedural, and recognition. While dominant justice claims revolve around the distribution of costs through rates, competing narratives emphasize procedural and recognition (in)justice. Focusing on political economy, power relations, and the materiality of the grid, I reframe the utility’s cost shift argument as a strategic narrative and explain why this justice claim is ultimately validated. I propose that UPE can further an energy justice analysis by understanding procedural and recognition injustice as systemic products of rate of return regulation and the material configuration of the electric grid.

In cities around the world, public water systems have increasingly come to be operated by private companies. Along with an internationally funded investment program to refurbish the dilapidated water infrastructure, private operations were tested also in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Only about a third of the households, however, are reached by the piped water system there; most households purchase water from those with pipe-connections or private boreholes. Thus, water distribution was informally privatized by way of water vending long before formal private sector participation began. This thesis explores individual and collective endeavors in water development, distribution, and access, along with the global and local influences that shaped the privatization exercise. With regard to the lease of Dar es Salaam’s water system, the institutional set-up has been found to mix the British and French models, having influenced the local situation through development assistance and conditionalities tied to loans. The institutional contradictions may have contributed to the conflictive cancellation of the lease arrangement. Due to the public utility company’s lack of operating capital and investment planning, infrastructure development has responded mainly to immediate individual demands, resulting in a spaghetti-like network and structural leakage. The long-standing under-performance and low coverage of the piped water system have forced many people to devise their own ways to access water. This thesis argues that the individually-devised artisan ways of water provisioning constitute the life-line of Dar es Salaam’s water system. Yet, they also undermine and divert resources away from the collectively-devised industrial form of piped water provision.