Abstract

This paper examines the enactment of green hydrogen futures in Chilean Patagonia. Complementing the literature on socio-technical imaginaries, we explore the role of anticipatory practices as a key means by which certain energy futures and technological interventions around green hydrogen (GH2) materialize, while other alternatives are discarded. We explore how, through these socio-material practices, the value of this new fuel is staged and dramatized. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, interviews, and secondary material, we empirically study two situations in which the green hydrogen futures are staged: GH2 technology fairs, and GH2 project prototypes and demonstrations. While the former involves the performance of atmospheres of imminence and business opportunity in which technological innovations, economic opportunities and public policies are realized in the present, the latter work as socio-material interventions and sites that enable the value of this new fuel to materialize for different audiences. The article highlights three critical aspects of these anticipatory practices: the socio-material and situated dimension, the spectacle and representation of value, and the type of energy politics they entail for producing hydrogen futures. We conclude by discussing theoretical insights around the central role of materialities and practices for enacting specific forms of techno-optimist energy futures.