Ingrid Altamirano

About me

I am a doctoral student at the Department of Human Geography and have a background in international relations and geopolitics of critical minerals, with a MSc in Human Ecology and a MA in Epistemology of the South. My research interests focus on the intersection of environmental and social sustainability, with a strong emphasis on interdisciplinary approaches to energy transitions and extractivism, both in the Global South and Global North.

I have spent my entire adult life teaching and holding workshops for youth and adults. I have done this in various contexts, including civil society organizations, municipal schools as well as universities and other forums in Sweden, Denmark, Japan and Mexico. I have worked as a research assistant, lecturer and substitute teacher, been active as an academic advisor, programme and project coordinator. Besides, I have worked on a voluntary basis within several organisations.

About my research project

I currently study the lithium and copper supply chains embedded in the European Union's battery production for electric automobility and the correspondent dynamics of social reproduction of labour.
In my Ph.D. research I aim to empirically assess how the green European transition towards electrical vehicles risks reproducing inequality across several axes, with disproportionately distributed economic gains, social, and environmental burdens. And above all what it entails for the everyday lives of marginalised groups of people, particularly migrant and female workers. Since human labour is at the center of social reproduction, a just green energy transition cannot be analysed without taking it into account.