Abstract
Energy Community Initiatives (ECIs) present important beacons in moving to a more sustainable energy provision at household level. The success of ECIs, however, depends on how they are framed as socially acceptable in and around the locations where they are active. Using framing analysis, this paper examines the framing of three urban and seven rural Dutch ECI cases in the period 1989–2017. Key questions are: how have Dutch ECIs been framed in the regional and national press through time, concerning their (positive) contribution to the energy transition and their support, versus (negative) perceptions of ineffectiveness and resistance? Second, to what extent does framing manifest spatial (urban versus rural) and scalar (regional versus national) patterns and divides? The data consists of 527 newspaper expressions focusing on six themes (economic, environmental, social, political, local-development, innovation). Results show that ECIs generally meet a positive framing, emphasizing economic, environmental and community benefits. However, this positivity is primarily related to the instrumental need for ECIs to prove community acceptance rather than exposing ECIs’ strategic roles in promoting the energy transition. Only in urban centres we find relatively more attention for ECIs’ transformational role. We suggest that the energy transition still stands to benefit from a stronger advocacy of ECIs’ contribution notably through a better strategic and spatial framing. This may serve to overcome continuing resistance in more rural locations.
Highlights
In the face of climate change, the transition from a fossil-fuel based system to an energy system based upon Renewable Energy (RE) has become more important and urgent
Historical and spatial perspective, this paper presents an empirical study of the social acceptance of Energy Community Initiatives (ECIs) through media framing
This paper explored how Dutch ECIs have been framed between 1989 and 2017, weighing their positive contribution to the energy transition and their support in terms of community and po litical acceptance, against negative perceptions of ineffectiveness and resistance
Summary
In the face of climate change, the transition from a fossil-fuel based system to an energy system based upon Renewable Energy (RE) has become more important and urgent. Social acceptance by citizens breeds support amongst key political stakeholders (Devi ne-Wright et al, 2017). Such a prominent role of ECIs chimes with in sights from both researchers and policy makers on ‘grassroots’ contribution to sustainability transitions, in the energy sector (Hewitt et al, 2019, Berka and Creamer, 2018), agriculture (Hermans, Roep and Klerkx, 2016) and cohousing (Boyer and Leland, 2018), amongst others. The challenge of social acceptance is compounded, by its spatial scope, notably from an urban-rural perspective. Historical and spatial perspective, this paper presents an empirical study of the social acceptance of ECIs through media framing.
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