The potential of host community compensation in facility siting

Abstract

Overcoming local public opposition is a major challenge for the siting of carbon capture and storage (CCS) facilities, not in the least because CCS facilities are perceived by the public as potentially imposing harm on the host community, while their benefits are mostly non-local. Host community compensation may help to adjust this imbalance and to increase local public acceptance of CCS facilities. To date, however, there is no empirical research that has examined the effectiveness of host community compensation in a CCS context. This article reviews the broader literature on compensation as a first step towards understanding why and when host community compensation may or may not work in CCS settings. We identify several factors that may codetermine how members of the local public respond to compensation offers (e.g. the type of compensation offered; the perceived riskiness of a proposed facility; initial local opinion) and provide suggestions for future research in this field. Furthermore, we explore how some of the insights into the effectiveness of compensation as reported in the facility siting literature may apply to CCS. We conclude that while host community compensation is no panacea, it has the potential to help prevent or solve (CCS) facility siting controversies.