The Barnim district is a pioneer of the energy transition in Brandenburg and Germany. The federal government’s climate protection targets for 2020 were already achieved in 2011. The Barnimer Energiegesellschaft (BEG) is in charge of coordinating the zero-emissions strategy and will become part of an entrepreneurial alliance of the recently adopted district utilities in 2017. An important goal is to involve the municipalities and the population of the district in the energy transition. To this end, BEG has commissioned the Berlin-based nexus Institute and BUND Brandenburg to conduct an acceptance and participation study on the following questions:
- How do acceptance and the will to participate of different groups of actors change as a result of the direct energy industry activities of municipalities and newly founded project companies (using the example of the Barnim district)?
- What contribution do individual concrete measures make to increasing acceptance and the will to participate in a communally controlled energy transition?
The study includes, in particular, on-site and telephone interviews with representatives from politics and administration, experts in the field of renewable energies, environmental associations and initiatives as well as citizens of the district. The survey will be conducted twice, first at the end of 2016/beginning of 2017, then at the beginning of 2018, in order to identify possible changes in acceptance and participation behaviour and to be able to respond to them with concrete measures.
Duration: 11/2016 – 05/2018
Client: Barnimer Energiegesellschaft
Team: Dr. Thomas Blanchet (Project management), Dr. Carsten Herzberg (Project management), Manuela Weber
Project partner: BUND Brandenburg