ABSTRACT
The vision of the Desertec concept reads ambitious: the large-scale installation of concentrated solar power (CSP) plants in the deserts of the Middle East and North Africa region (MENA), it is hoped, will provide clean energy for Europe and the producing host countries. Moreover, Desertec, it is believed, will provide solutions for the challenges of food and water scarcity, global climate change and overcrowding. This political vision, since 2009 represented by the Desertec label, has received broad political support from the EU. This transformation, the vision promises, could take place without any fundamental change in the socio-economic and power structure in the region. This logic is so dominant in the Desertec discourse that it was not even challenged or altered by the politicising events of the 'Arab Spring'. The discourse about the Desertec concept hence represents a paradigmatic example of persistence in times of change.
