Streamlining marine energy consenting processes: Considering public attitudes in the development of public engagement strategies

To achieve renewable energy targets and energy security, marine areas around the UK are becoming an important arena for energy generation. Large, high capacity wind parks are being planned, whilst more nascent technologies, such as wave and tidal, are also being developed. Despite strong public support for renewable energy in principle (Bell et al. 2005), public opposition on the grounds of visual intrusion or other local social or environmental impacts has long been recognised as a major barrier to the commissioning of onshore renewable energy projects. Currently, around 60% of onshore wind-power planning applications are rejected by councils in England and Wales for these or similar reasons. Even where applications are granted, such problems contribute to delays in delivering renewable energy targets, increased time processing applications and high transaction costs for developers and the public sector (Cotton et al. 2011). Although the physical separation of MRE from centres of population removes many tensions, recent studies argue that offshore sites not unproblematic alternatives (Bailey et al 2011; Haggett 2011).

Improved understandings of public attitudes to MRE schemes is, therefore, vital to 40SouthEnergy and other private and public organisations involved with MRE. The partner organisation needs this information at the local level to enable them to mitigate problems experienced with onshore technologies, whilst insights from the research have the potential to be applied into other areas where MRE deployments are considered. Currently, there is limited information on whether local communities support or oppose MRE developments and the underlying reasons for this. This has resulted in turn in limited guidance to help the project partner to develop public engagement strategies in their local areas.

This internship will help to overcome this deficit by exploring public attitudes to MRE and by enabling the partner organisation and other businesses and policy makers involved in MRE development and consenting to make use of the NERC research. This contributes to development of effective community engagement strategies whilst ensuring appropriate management of the socio-economic impacts of MRE. The internship will also facilitate knowledge exchange by applying the wider research expertise of Plymouth University (School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences and the EU-funded MERiFIC project) on social attitudes to MRE and strategies for reducing the risks and uncertainties of MRE consenting in combination with the applicant's existing knowledge of public attitudes and engagement preferences developed as part of her PhD study.

Methods:
For the internship, a dataset will be developed on public attitudes to different types of MRE options in the South-West of England.
1) A questionnaire survey will be conducted in the Isles of Scilly to gather a statistically generalisable dataset of residents and visitors' attitudes to MRE developments.
2) Targeted interviews will be conducted with local organisations to gain deeper insights on the perceived benefits and threats for local communities posed by MRE.
3) A review of current guidance on public engagement strategies will be conducted to identify best practice on this issue. Due to the limited guidance available for MRE developments, this exercise will include guidance for engagement strategies for onshore renewables and other policy areas so as to collate and synthesise best practice in this area.

The survey results will be discussed with the public and private sector partner, where the applicant will examine with partners how the needs of the MRE sector can best be met through integration of the results in examples of best practice found. Depending on the needs of the partner organisation, the knowledge will be further developed into guidance on developing public engagement strategies based on both the needs of the marine energy sector and the public.