Biophysicality, Social Reproduction and the Limits of Renewables Capitalism

This article debates the prospect of renewables capitalism and the hypothesis that capitalism per se does not require fossil fuels from a feminist degrowth perspective by elucidating how capitalism, its imperatives and its contradictions — and thus the potentiality of renewables capitalism — would be viewed from this perspective. To this end, the article outlines a feminist degrowth understanding of capitalism by building on traditions and frameworks which inform degrowth thinking, delineating two aspects in particular: the biophysicality of capitalism and its conception as a heterogeneous social formation. This particular understanding of capitalism is then mobilized to elaborate on the potential contradictions of renewables capitalism, structured around the limits and constraints that the biophysical properties of renewables would pose for capitalism and the labour of social‐ecological reproduction in renewables capitalism. The article concludes by highlighting the contribution of a feminist degrowth perspective to contemporary debates on renewables capitalism, as well as the lessons to be drawn from degrowth thinkers over the prospect of a renewables transition led by capital.