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Financialising urban water infrastructure: Extracting local value, distributing value globally

Author

Listed:
  • Michael Pryke

    (The Open University, UK)

  • John Allen

    (The Open University, UK)

Abstract

Since the insertion of urban infrastructure into the risk-taking world of financialisation, techniques for capturing added value from underlying revenue streams, from securitisation and derivatives to the structuring of bond and equity returns, have come to the fore. A value model, based on extraction through interest and dividends paid, as well as multiple fees, in our view, has benefited investors and financial intermediaries alike. Through the example of Carlsbad desalination plant in San Diego, California, the paper sets out to show how a piece of drinking water infrastructure was translated as a value asset to match the needs of institutional investors in the USA and beyond. The geography of value capture and its distribution globally is shown to be not simply financially innovative, but also spatially innovative and perhaps best understood through its topological spaces.

Suggested Citation

  • Michael Pryke & John Allen, 2019. "Financialising urban water infrastructure: Extracting local value, distributing value globally," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 56(7), pages 1326-1346, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:urbstu:v:56:y:2019:i:7:p:1326-1346
    DOI: 10.1177/0042098017742288
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Citations

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    Cited by:

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    3. Heather Whiteside, 2019. "Advanced perspectives on financialised urban infrastructures," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 56(7), pages 1477-1484, May.
    4. Daniela Gabor, 2021. "The Wall Street Consensus," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 52(3), pages 429-459, May.
    5. Nizkorodov, Evgenia, 2021. "Evaluating risk allocation and project impacts of sustainability-oriented water public–private partnerships in Southern California: A comparative case analysis," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    6. Peter O’Brien & Phil O’Neill & Andy Pike, 2019. "Funding, financing and governing urban infrastructures," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 56(7), pages 1291-1303, May.
    7. Peter O’Brien & Andy Pike, 2019. "‘Deal or no deal?’ Governing urban infrastructure funding and financing in the UK City Deals," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 56(7), pages 1448-1476, May.
    8. Phil McManus & Graham Haughton, 2021. "Fighting to undo a deal: Identifying and resisting the financialization of the WestConnex motorway, Sydney, Australia," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 53(1), pages 131-149, February.
    9. Callum Ward, 2021. "Contradictions of Financial Capital Switching: Reading the Corporate Leverage Crisis through The Port of Liverpool's Whole Business Securitization," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(2), pages 249-265, March.
    10. N/A, 2020. "Book symposium: Pike et al.’s Financialising City Statecraft and Infrastructure," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 52(4), pages 790-813, June.
    11. Jeroen Klink & Vanessa Lucena Empinotti & Marcelo Aversa, 2020. "On contested water governance and the making of urban financialisation: Exploring the case of metropolitan São Paulo, Brazil," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 57(8), pages 1676-1695, June.

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