À qui le soleil : how Morocco’s developing solar capacities have altered urban infrastructural provisions

The creation of a sustainable, solar-based energy sector in Morocco involves changes to both its domestic energy infrastructure as well as the surrounding political and financial arrangements. This research shows that such changes affect Morocco’s most vulnerable urban citizens, specifically those without current grid service, or hacked grid service: those who live in bidonvilles, or shantytowns and slums. I trace such changes in Morocco’s solar energy to the perpetuation of neocolonial narratives of European energy and historical uses of infrastructure in urban manifestations of colonialism. With a focus on domestic large-scale solar energy generation systems like the publicly-operated MASEN, as well as international, public-private enterprises such as Desertec (a German-Moroccan partnership that is mega-regional in scope), this thesis assesses the level of access afforded to bidonville citizens in Morocco’s biggest city, Casablanca. I offer some ideas on how the flexibility and accessibility in the scale and operation of solar can provide generation capacities to urban citizens living in informal communities.