1) Public knowledge and support of CCS was generally low, while stakeholders had higher knowledge but were less supportive, especially of local projects. 2) Attitudes became more negative after receiving information about risks, costs, and impacts. Support decreased with proximity to storage and capture sites. 3) Trust in developers and governments was lowest while university scientists were most trusted to provide impartial information about CCS projects.

1. A Case Study in Public Perceptions of
Energy Technologies:
Local and Regional Concerns over CCS
Infrastructure in Five EU Countries
David Reiner
University of Cambridge
Presentation to the UK Winter School
12 January 2012

2. National Projects (EERP funded)
• Implement public and stakeholder surveys in
five EU member states which have received
EU stimulus package funding for CCS projects
– UK: Hatfield/Don Valley
– Netherlands: Maasvlakte
– Germany: Jaenschwalde
– Spain: Ponferrada
– Poland: Bełchatów

3. Target Groups
• General public (n=200 national, n=200 region)
Regional Stakeholders
• Local and regional politicians/members of
planning and environment committees
• Local and regional officials
• NGOs/local community groups
• Journalists

4. Methods for Collecting Data
• Online Questionnaire targeted key stakeholders
in each region and general public in each
country (~200 regional and ~200 national)
– Pre-test by interviewing at least one member of
each target group per country to assist in better
understanding of local contingencies
• Dialogue Boards (qualitative analysis tool)
• Experiment (to test importance of visual
communication material)

5. Demographics
• Participants were
surveyed (online)
Jan-Feb 11
• Responses from
Public survey: 2338;
Stakeholders: 170
• Public survey: 51%
Stakeholder survey Male, 49% Female
• Stakeholder survey:
77% Male and 23%
female
• ~60% of stakeholders
from Germany
Notes: UK - 28 respondents; NL – 22; DE – 103; PL – 12;
ES - 5

6. Questionnaire Outline
0: Position (public, stakeholders)
1: Background attitudes and knowledge
2: CCS, general
3: Local plans
4. Additional Information on CCS
5. Information sources
6. Local community
7. Procedural Justice
8. Media preferences
9. Sections for different stakeholders
10. Demographics

8. Survey System - Intro

9. Questionnaire – Geographic Interface

10. Distances to Storage and
Capture Sites

11. German Interface (2 storage sites)

12. Genuine Knowledge of CCS versus
Claimed Awareness
Public Stakeholders
a
UK NL DE PL ES Average DE Average
No, never heard 56% 23% 46% 42% 49% 43% 2% 3%
A little bit 37% 66% 39% 50% 43% 46% 11% 19%
Yes, quite a bit 7% 12% 15% 8% 9% 10% 87% 78%
N 459 415 518 535 407 2334 102 170

13. Likely source of information
regarding CCS
UK NL DE PL ES
National/international NGOs 34% 40% 52% 44% 35%
Local NGOs/community
groups, residents' associations 33% 42% 51% 42% 27%
Friends, neighbours, family 13% 26% 27% 36% 29%
National media 44% 57% 56% 51% 34%
Local/regional media 47% 57% 55% 48% 34%
National government 48% 61% 37% 35% 28%
Local/regional government 48% 62% 41% 45% 28%
Interactive websites 51% 55% 53% 78% 48%
University scientists 47% 54% 60% 59% 37%
Developers, energy companies 42% 28% 31% 27% 20%
European Union 20% 30% 23% 42% 25%

14. Likelihood to seek further
information about project

15. Trust to give you impartial
information?

16. Trust to Take Local Concerns
Seriously?

17. Attitudes towards CCS in general
and towards the local project

18. Shift in attitudes towards project
after information was provided

19. Reactions of different groups to
information
All groups have Mean SD
a more negative Genuine
knowledge
opinion after
No -.35 1.05
information, but Yes -.18 1.11
the effect is t value -2.86a
strongest among Gender
women and less Male -.19 1.01
knowledgeable Female -.46 1.11
t value 5.54b

20. Local Project Support versus
Distance to Capture Site

21. Local Project Support versus
Distance to Storage Site

22. Support for Project and Trust in
Local Developers
Trust in the project developers
Group
Support for the UK NL DE PL ES
local project Ma SD Ma SD Ma SD Ma SD Ma SD
1 strongly opposed 1.70 1.34 1.61 1.39 2.02 1.46 2.80 2.17 2.47 2.00
2 - 2.14 1.17 1.84 .85 2.34 1.22 2.67 1.78 1.93 1.22
3 - 2.15 1.26 2.40 1.19 2.56 1.45 2.32 1.18 3.00 1.85
4 neutral 3.13 1.73 2.76 1.35 3.39 1.48 3.20 1.55 3.39 1.58
5 - 3.41 1.57 3.13 1.50 3.50 1.56 3.54 1.63 3.87 1.72
6 - 3.65 1.72 3.25 1.52 4.11 1.52 3.48 1.77 4.48 1.64
7 strongly 4.84 1.37 4.00 1.85 4.73 2.33 3.49 2.03 5.71 1.61
supportive

23. Support for Project and Perceived
Past Treatment of Local Community

24. Support for Project and Perceived
Fairness of Planning Process

25. Social Capital and Support for CCS
y = 0.19x + 4.57 y = 0.25x + 3.82
R² = 0.96 R² = 0.96
Attitudes towards CCS (MEAN)
How often do you spend time with colleagues from work or your profession outside the workplace?
Attitudes towards CCS in general* Attitudes towards the local project**
Linear (Attitudes towards CCS in general*) Linear (Attitudes towards the local project**)

26. Survey Open Questions
•Respondents were asked free-text questions on
what they perceived as advantages,
disadvantages of the project and CCS, and
whether they had any further questions.
•The answers were analysed qualitatively for the
most frequent themes

27. Advantages and Disadvantages
Count Advantages Count Disadvantages
818 Reduced CO2 emissions 587 No answer, not sure
434 No answer/don’t know 313 Expensive
329 Good for environment 243 Unforeseen problems; untested tech
98 Creates jobs 212 Safety worries, unspecified or general
53 It's offshore 181 No disadvantages
44 Cuts costs; helps economy 142 Risk of leakage
43 Energy security 141 Bad for environment
38 Provides (clean) energy 79 Not solving the problem
37 Good, undefined 77 Effect on locality
34 Distance 53 Worries over transport
28 Safety; storage is safe 52 Public acceptance
17 Energy efficiency 31 Limits of storage capacity
16 “The storage” 26 Divert attention from alternatives
15 Ozone layer 19 Risk of explosions
10 Not nuclear 8 Information needs
9 Development of new tech 7 Not energy efficient
152 Disadvantages/no advantages

28. Common questions/statements
 Safety worries
 Costs
 What happens in the long-term?
 Risk to the environment
 Need more information
 We should look to alternatives
 Will it work?
 Practical questions (when, how, where exactly?)

29. Dialogue Boards
Introduction
•Two “virtual focus groups” were held a month after the survey with
around 50 selected survey respondents from Poland and Spain.
•An online dialogue board was run over 2 days. On each day a
number of open-ended questions are posed to which respondents
respond. The guiding principle was that respondents log on at least
twice a day and post their responses  average participation of one
to two hours a day for each respondent.
•Participants were asked about their opinions on CCS and specific
projects, what images or metaphors they associate with it, how it fits
into their general attitudes towards climate change, and
whether/how the survey itself has influenced their opinions on CCS.

30. Dialogue Boards:
Knowledge, information & participation
• Participants had not generally heard of CCS or the specific
projects previously
• Though most participants sought more information after
the survey, they were mostly dissatisfied with the available
material
• Participants tried to talk to friends, colleagues and
neighbours after the survey, but found that generally there
was not much interest or knowledge
• The survey and DB were seen as positive experiences by
participants who were pleased that their opinions were
seen as important

31. Dialogue Boards:
Risks and Safety
• Safety was seen as the most important factor influencing
attitudes towards CCS: Even those participants generally in
favour were insistent on safety standards being met
adequately.
• Risks were also seen as problematic due to the long-term
nature of CCS: adequate guarantees of safety cannot be
made for an indefinite future – who knows what will
happen in 100 years time?
• The DBs were held during the week after the Japanese
earthquake: This episode demonstrated to many
participants that even the best safety measures can be
defeated by unforeseen events.

32. Dialogue Boards:
Costs and Burdens
• Participants saw the economic benefits in terms of job
creation and (in Poland) evading EU fines for not meeting
emissions targets
• But CCS was also seen as possibly leading to a drop in
tourism and driving out the local population which worried
about the risks.
• Participants were concerned about who will meet the costs
of CCS –seen as either taxpayers or the energy consumers.
• Expectation that politicians and energy companies will
profit from CCS, and a general feeling of industry benefiting
at the expense of ordinary people.

33. Summary
• Distance matters – Distance to capture and storage sites
have different relationships to support for CCS projects
• Trust matters – Project developers and governments are not
only the least trusted, but their information is less likely to
be consulted and those with less trust in the planning
process or developers and bad past experience are more
likely to oppose projects
• Knowledge and information matters – Support for CCS
projects tended to erode with more information, but this
was most notable among those with lower levels of
education and less genuine knowledge. Stakeholders and
sensitized publics (Germany and Netherlands) were much
more likely to seek information from multiple sources

34. Credits
The NearCO2 team: Kong Chyong, Hauke Riesch, Xi Liang,
Paul Upham, Elisabeth Duetschke, Marjolein de Best-
Waldhober, Mariette Pol, Sylvia Breukers, Aleksandra
Ola, Christian Oltra, Jane Desbarats, Suzanne Brunsting
Survey instrument design: LinksChina
Survey implementation : TNS-NIPO
Full report and further information can be found at:
http://www.communicationnearco2.eu

35. Thanks!
David M Reiner
Electricity Policy Research Group
Judge Business School
University of Cambridge
Trumpington Street
Cambridge, UK
CB2 1AG
dmr40@cam.ac.uk
+44-1223-339616

37. Knowledge
• 43% of public respondents had never heard of
CCS, and 10% indicated they knew quite a bit.
Only 3% of stakeholders claimed never to have
heard of CCS and 78% stated knew “quite a bit”.
• Only 19% of all public respondents indicated
‘genuine knowledge’ although this is higher than
the 10% claiming to know “quite a bit” about
CCS. Whereas 78% of stakeholders claimed to
know “quite a bit”, just over half (51%) indicated
that CCS only addresses climate.

38. Attitudes I
• The public in all five countries were supportive
of CCS in general (net +51% favourable)
ranging from net +72% favourable rating in
Poland to +20% in Germany. Stakeholders
were more negative (net -20%).
• The relationship between respondent position
relative to the capture site and their attitudes
towards CCS was found to be less pronounced
than their position relative to the storage site.

39. Attitudes II
• Relative to CCS in general, support for the
local project was notably lower (10% lower
net favourable rating among the public most
dramatically in Germany and 16% lower net
favourable score among stakeholders). In the
other four countries, there are still large
majorities who view the local project
favourably (ranging from +38% net favourable
in the Netherlands to +66% in Poland).

40. Information Sources I
• Stakeholders were far more likely to consult
different sources and more than half consulted
any of six different sources of information.
• In all countries, the least likely sources were the
EU, developers and word of mouth.
• Similar to stakeholders, German and Dutch
public respondents were much more likely to
choose multiple sources and six different sources
were listed by over half of respondents.

41. Information Sources II
• Stakeholders were very likely to seek more
information about the project. Among public
respondents, only the Dutch were more likely
than not to want additional information.
• University scientists scored highest in terms of
respondents' trust to give them impartial
information about CCS, followed by
national/international NGOs; developers,
governments and word of mouth scored
lowest.