Of booms, busts, and sustainability: A socio-technical transition study of Iceland's mobility regime and its proximity to strong sustainability

The need to reconfigure provisioning systems to achieve a good life within the planetary boundaries has been recognized, but few studies have investigated the temporal change dynamics of such systems in the context of strong sustainability. Using Iceland's mobility sector as a case study, the effects of significant economic swings and other landscape/innovation developments from 1995 to 2018 were narrated. The influence of these factors on Iceland's mobility provisioning, and the associated impact of these changes on the sector's ecological overshoot and transport poverty/social externality indicators, were considered. The results showed that Iceland came close to achieving a just space by the end of the period, but where significant overshoot was seen throughout. This overshoot fluctuated with the country's economic booms and busts, reaching almost 1.5x at its peak as compared to its lowest point. These results identify the need to reduce the ecological intensity of Iceland's mobility provisioning.