From social ‘acceptance’ to social ‘acceptability’ of wind energy projects: towards a territorial perspective

Abstract

Social acceptance is central in many debates surrounding energy projects. Wind energy, in particular, has been described as a ‘learning laboratory’ in terms of social acceptance of energy projects. It has given way to a socio-technical paradox: the social dimension has become a factor of equal importance to technology in the wind farms implementation. Based on a literature review concerned with the social acceptance of wind energy, the paper seeks to demonstrate both the richness and the limits of the key concepts that inform the ongoing work of scholars. By doing so, we intend to emphasise the complex processes underneath in order to then elaborate a conceptual definition of social acceptability. Various modulations and limits that characterise current thinking are thus underlined. We then propose a grid analysis relying on a territorial perspective. It is structured around three levels that connect micro-social, meso-political and macro-economic processes.

Keywords:

• social acceptance
• renewable energy
• territory
• sustainable development
• social acceptability

Acknowledgements

This paper is part of a literature review carried out and funded as part of a study conducted for the Strategic Environmental Assessment Committee on Shale Gas and Quebec's Ministry of Sustainable Development, Environment, Wildlife and Parks. The paper is a modified version of Chapter 2 of the resulting report (Fortin and Fournis, 2013).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. We favoured this terminology distinction in order to better differentiate the complex processes underneath (social acceptability), from the results of it (acceptance/unacceptance). This proposal might be seen to be adding confusion to an already complex debate but it seemed necessary. This proposal comes from different influences. One is linguistic: in French literature, ‘acceptance’ (acceptation) is hardly used. Moreover, social debates observed clearly point out this twist related to ‘acceptance’, which is that it is often presented by promoters as being the only option. In this manner, it seems relevant to try to distinguish the two, the process from its results. The debate over the interpretation of community benefits brought by Cowell, Bristow, and Munday (2011) appears to be in line with this need to give greater attention to underlying processes: “the complex nature of ‘acceptability’, and how it relates to the institutions governing decision making and the use of resources. It ignores the multiple ways in which these practices are rationalised by parties in development processes (Cass et al. 2010) and risks conflating ‘acceptance’ and ‘acceptability’ (see also Szarka 2007)” (Cowell, Bristow, and Munday 2011, 540).

2. In January 2012, we first made a research for articles including the expression social acceptability and closed terms (social acceptance; public acceptance) on two data bases, one in English (Scopus) the other in French (Francis), published between the end of the 1980s and 2011. More than a thousand titles were identified. We selected among those a first set of texts such as those that were the most cited, those with an epistemology concern, and those that were bringing new dimensions to the analysis. They related mainly to peer-review articles, books and book chapters.

3. Issued from European lines of thought on the role of technological innovation in environmental reform, the current has progressively acquired complexity through its considerations of institutional, cultural and activist dynamics, as well as of the global dimensions of environmental reforms (Mol and Spaargaren 2009).

4. This classification was inspired by a study by Bélanger and Lévesque (1992) and has been applied previously to wind energy issues (Fortin and Fournis 2014). It is important to note that the distinction between these three levels is methodological and conceptual, and does not represent a distinction among spatial scales: the processes under discussion occur on and intersect multiple spatial and time scales.

5. According to Walker and Cass (2007, 464): “captive consumer; active customer; service user; financial investor; local beneficiary; project protestor; project supporter; project participant; technology host; and energy producer”.

6. And it is undoubtedly symptomatic that one of the rare examples of an extensive consideration of collective action in the literature is counter-intuitive, since it disregards local opposition, viewing militant networks that have historically supported wind energy as the prime social movement impacting on the industry (Toke 2011b).

Additional information

Funding

Quebec's Strategic Environmental Assessment Committee on Shale Gas