Project description: Aim

• The national level, which is characterised by a few decision-makers with some expert knowledge and where accountability is most important;
  
  
• The local/regional community level, which is characterised by a large number of stakeholders who are predominantly laypersons, and where it is most important that an agreement holds, even if formal ways to enforce it may be missing.
  
  

The MCE method used for comparing and assessing different RETs was developed and refined in recent years by two of the investigators (Madlener and Stagl, various references). The project aims to extend and refine this framework and evaluate its practical applicability in the context of RET promotion. Austria is particularly suitable for the project, because it is a European country that is (1) actively pursuing to significantly increase the share of energy generated from renewable energy sources; and that (2) worldwide has leading expertise for several RETs (e.g. biomass-, solar-thermal- and PV-based); and that (3) has some leading expertise in the field of research addressed in the project.

In particular, three future energy scenarios at both the national (or regional) and the local community level will be explored. The exploration involves the following steps:

• Development of life-cycle-based impact matrices for modern RETs (currently there is a severe lack of data, especially concerning the social and to some extent also the macro-economic dimension); major conventional technologies will be included for comparisons and for the construction of the scenarios envisaged. This first step relies heavily on the integration of existing databases. Generic technology coefficients suitable for the European context will be employed, and if necessary carefully adapted, for use both at the national and the local/regional level. Uncertainty in the data is explicitly allowed for, i.e. ranges of values are provided whenever adequate and available.
  
  
• Exploring social preferences for different national and local /regional energy scenarios.
  
  
• Using and evaluating existing MCE tools and developing procedures for a participatory exploration of different (energy) scenarios at the national and the local/regional community level.