Low carbon heating transitions and Actor Network Theory: Entanglements with the fireside

We share findings from 30 oral histories of home heating (1945 to present) gathered in the former coal mining town of Rotherham in Northern England. By analysing these rich personal accounts using Actor Network Theory (ANT), we reveal the coal fire (or coal-fired range) as a powerful actant shaping domestic life in the decades following the end of the Second World War. This exposes important, previously unacknowledged, relational-material entanglements with the fireside, which endure despite many decades of gas central heating in the UK. The nature and strength of these entanglements have implications for the socially and culturally sensitive handling of efforts (across Europe) to transition households to more technological low carbon heating systems, such as heat pumps. This paper sets out early findings from the UK component of a Europe-wide project which innovatively seeks to establish a social and cultural history of home heating in order to distil lessons for a more socially and culturally conscious transition to low carbon heating systems.