Creating a national citizen engagement process for energy policy

Abstract

This paper examines some of the science communication challenges involved when designing and conducting public deliberation processes on issues of national importance. We take as our illustrative case study a recent research project investigating public values and attitudes toward future energy system change for the United Kingdom. National-level issues such as this are often particularly difficult to engage the public with because of their inherent complexity, derived from multiple interconnected elements and policy frames, extended scales of analysis, and different manifestations of uncertainty. With reference to the energy system project, we discuss ways of meeting a series of science communication challenges arising when engaging the public with national topics, including the need to articulate systems thinking and problem scale, to provide balanced information and policy framings in ways that open up spaces for reflection and deliberation, and the need for varied methods of facilitation and data synthesis that permit access to participants' broader values. Although resource intensive, national-level deliberation is possible and can produce useful insights both for participants and for science policy.public engagement | national dialogue | energy system transitions

Why Is Ownership an Issue? Exploring Factors That Determine Public Acceptance of Product-Service Systems

“…Building on established methodological techniques for exploring public engagement with, and acceptability of, different science and technology issues [28,41], a bespoke method for exploring the public acceptability of alternative systems of production and consumption was developed. A series of deliberative workshops were designed, aiming to elicit public perceptions and values surrounding PSS.…”

“…As such, these studies are also usually case study specific, with relatively little currently known about the acceptance of these new business models within the wider public. Both willing and able to engage in complex debate surrounding energy futures and sustainability [28], we argue that the wider public should have a voice in the debate surrounding the transition towards a more circular, resource efficient economy and the future business models that may develop within it, both as future users and more broadly as citizens. As such, although evidence from case studies can be very effective in investigating the motivations and concerns of individuals participating in specific PSS, the wider perceptions and meanings surrounding the broader concept of PSS that may be evoked are less likely to be fully explored.…”

Effects of exemplar scenarios on public preferences for energy futures using the my2050 scenario-building tool

“…In this regard, public perspectives can provide insights into potential social opportunities and constraints of energy pathways, and in particular which aspects and configurations of system change will provide socially acceptable levels of energy security, affordability, and environmental protection. Considering public views in this way is also important because energy transitions as a whole will involve people and communities in multiple ways-from consumers deciding how they should use the services that energy provides, to the ways in which society as a whole grants energy system providers a social licence to operate 14,15 . While there exists a wealth of evidence reporting public views of individual supply-side technologies and infrastructure, or on particular aspects of energy demand-side change (for example, refs [16][17][18][19], there is little research that meaningfully engages people with the complexities of system change as a whole (although see refs 20-26).…”

Asking about the future: methodological insights from energy biographies

“…Use is made, for example, of structured techniques such as questionnaire and survey questions about future plans (e.g. Pidgeon, Demski, Butler, Parkhill, & Spence, 2014 in relation to energy research). This approach has been invoked in large birth cohort studies (such as the National Child Development Study, British Cohort Study and Millennium Cohort Study) where children have been asked to describe their aspirations for the future.…”