solarpunk

Solarpunk works to address how the future might look if humanity succeeded in solving major contemporary challenges with an emphasis on sustainability, human impact on the environment, and addressing climate change and pollution. It borrows elements from utopian and fantasy genres, as well as Afrofuturism and retrofuturism. The term originated in 2008, with the term and associated works gaining popularity online over the following years.

Solarpunk is a sub-genre of speculative fiction which imagines positive futures driven by clean energy without scarcity. The solarpunk aesthetic typically utilizes natural colors, bright greens and blues, and allusions to diverse cultural origins. Examples of this aesthetic include the depiction of Wakanda in Marvel Studios' Black Panther, Auroa in Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Breakpoint, and some Studio Ghibli movies, particularly Castle in the Sky and Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. In contrast to cyberpunk, which is portrayed as having a dark, grim aesthetic surrounded by an artificial and domineering built environment reflective of alienation and subjugation, solarpunk is bright, with light often used as a motif and in imagery to convey feelings of cleanliness, abundance, and equability.

The term solarpunk was coined in 2008 in a blog post titled "From Steampunk to Solarpunk", The anonymous author, taking the design of the MS Beluga Skysails (the world's first ship partially powered by a computer-controlled kite rig) as inspiration, conceptualizes a new speculative fiction subgenre with steampunk's focal point on specific technologies but guided by practicality and modern economics. Fictional genres with a "-punk" suffix started with cyberpunk in the 1980s describing fiction incorporating computers and the internet, followed by steampunk which was set in the Victorian era and named after steam power in contrast to cyberpunk. In a similar vein, in 2009, literary publicist Matt Staggs posted a "GreenPunk Manifesto" on his blog describing his vision of a technophilic genre focused on knowable, do it yourself technologies and with emphasis on positive ecological and social change. Solarpunk was popularized in the 2010s as a reaction to the prevalence of bleak post-apocalyptic and dystopian media alongside an increased awareness of perceived problems with social injustice economic inequality, and impacts of climate change or environmental problems. As post-apocalyptic and dystopian was ubiquitous in media, solarpunk became an attractive alternative to some. Solarpunk is perceived as optimistic yet realistic in confronting contemporary problems. In 2015, journalist Jeet Heer said solarpunk was "more a call to arms than a substantial body of literature." After a visual artist posted concept art on Tumblr of a solarpunk aesthetic in 2014, researcher Adam Flynn contributed to the science fiction forum Project Hieroglyph with further definition of the emerging genre. Based on Flynn's notes and contributions on the website solarpunks.net, A Solarpunk Manifesto was published in 2019. It describes solarpunk as "a movement in speculative fiction, art, fashion, and activism that seeks to answer and embody the questions 'what does a sustainable civilization look like, and how can we get there?. In 2024, solarpunk entered The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. James Machell points to Songs from the Stars by Norman Spinrad as the subgenre's first text, and goes on to contrast solarpunk with cyberpunk, stating, "It is a rebellion against a rebellion, born out of dystopia fatigue."

While solarpunk has no specific political ideation, it does by default embrace the need for a collective movement away from polluting forms of energy. It practices prefigurative politics, creating spaces where the principles of a movement can be explored and demonstrated by enacting them in real life. Solarpunks practice the movement in various ways, including creating and living in communities (such as ecovillages), growing their own food, and a DIY ethic of working with what is available, including the thoughtful application of technology.

• Illustration — Solarpunk works often include visions of positive social change, like the above illustration of a respecialization center for former miners who lost their profession as the world abandoned fossil fuels. Stories set in the far future or in fantasy worlds often portray societal failures recognizable to contemporary audiences. These failures may include oppressive imbalances of wealth or power, degradation of natural habitat or processes, and impacts of climate change. Evidence of injustices, like social exclusion and environmental racism, may be present. Disastrous consequences are not necessarily averted but solarpunk tends to present a counter-dystopian perspective. Their worlds are not necessarily utopian but rather solarpunk seeks to present an alternative to a pessimistic, consequential dystopian outcome. To achieve this, themes of do it yourself ethics, convivial conservation, self-sustainability, social inclusiveness and positive psychology are often present. This perspective also more closely embeds the ideals of punk ideologies, such as anti-consumerism, egalitarianism and decentralization, than cyberpunk which typically includes protagonists with punk beliefs but in settings that are used more as a warning of a potential future.

The integration of technologies into society in a manner that improves social, economic and environmental sustainability is central to solarpunk. It is starkly contrasted to cyberpunk which portrays highly advanced technologies that have little influence on, or otherwise exacerbate social, economic, and environmental problems. Whereas cyberpunk envisions humanity becoming more alienated from its natural environment and subsumed by technology, solarpunk envisions settings where technology enables humanity to better co-exist with itself and its environment. Solarpunk is more similar to steampunk than cyberpunk. Both steampunk and solarpunk imagine new worlds but with different primary sources of energy; respectively, the steam engines, and renewable energy. Though, whereas steampunk focuses more on history and uses Victorian era aesthetics, solarpunk uses more Art Nouveau style and looks to the future. Solarpunk also shares some elements with retrofuturism, Afrofuturism, Bionics and Arts and Crafts. The retrofuturist reevaluation of technology, its desire for understandable mechanics, and rejection of mysterious black box technology, and in favor of appropriate technology, are found in solarpunk works. As is the Afrofuturist's counter to mass-cultural homogeneity, the reckoning of injustices, and use of architecture and technology to correct power imbalances and problems in accessibility.

Although solarpunk is concerned with technology, it also embraces low-tech ways of living sustainably such as gardening, permaculture, regenerative design, tool libraries, maker spaces, open-source, positive psychology, metacognition, and do-it-yourself ethics. Its themes may reflect on environmental philosophy such as bright green environmentalism and social ecology, as well as punk ideologies such as anarchism, socialism, anti-consumerism, anti-authoritarianism, anti-capitalism, civil rights, commoning, and decentralization.

Solarpunk acts as a future imaginary to subvert climate fatalism. It tends to advocate for the decolonization of energy, challenging eco-capitalism where renewable mega-products, also called green veils, harm indigenous communities. By prioritizing energy democracy and non-hierarchal governance, the movement promotes the reintegrations of human and ecological systems, replacing commodification with community-oriented environmental optimism.

Solarpunk often includes elements of racial and gender equality, drawing this theme from earlier utopian works. Ursula K. Le Guin's 1969 book The Left Hand of Darkness included gender fluidity. Her book The Dispossessed eliminated compulsory monogamy. Becky Chambers' 2021 solarpunk novel A Psalm for the Wild-Built included a main character who is non-binary.