The Paradigm of Energy Transition in Brazil: Scarcity and Abundance of Brazilian Semiarid Region

The Brazilian semiarid region has become very important for the electricity industry, as it is a space particularly conducive to the production of renewable energy, given its climatic characteristics, with high thermal values and high wind potential. The same characteristics affect water resources, since the rainfall regime marks the scarcity of water, providing a period of drought. Throughout the occupation of this region, this natural condition, in addition to social difficulties, was a political object of the rural elites, who treated it as a space of backwardness. A dual reality is currently taking shape in the region. On the one hand, the wind resource gives priority to economic interests and plays a global role in reducing the effects of climate change; on the other hand, living in poverty, unemployment, and hunger. This situation leads to an incomplete energy transition, far from the idea of justice, since electricity projects do not include the paradigm of living within the limits of scarcity, especially when they distance themselves from sharing the wealth generated by the electricity sector with the local population. Thus, the study presented here points to a critical reflection on the mode of production of the renewable energy industry in Brazil, when discussing scarcity and abundance in the semiarid region, in the context of the diffusion of socio-environmental sustainability in the twenty-first century.