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Raising Awareness of Anaerobic Digestion in the UK- Views of Key Stakeholders

Lookup NU author(s): Professor Graham BonwickORCiD

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).

Abstract

Meeting rising energy demand and sustainable development goals at the same time is a major challenge for policy makers in the 21^st century. The situation is further stressed by a rising world population, climate change, natural disasters and food security concerns. Renewable energy technologies such as anaerobic digestion (AD) proffer one solution for policy makers to overcome some of the challenges to sustainable development. The technology has been widely adopted in some parts of Europe (e.g. Germany, Denmark, Austria and Sweden), the United States and also parts of Asia and Africa. However in the United Kingdom (UK), the technology is under-developed, as was recognised in its anaerobic digestion strategy and action plan of 2011. This study focused on identifying options for raising awareness of AD technology in the UK. 21 key stakeholders divided into groups according to their expertise, were interviewed to explore their views on the areas of focus in the UK strategy and action plan regarding raising awareness of the technology. The results revealed that aligning AD with sustainable development goals, community AD and localism, small AD plants, provision of an available market for AD products, building UK skills and diversifying biogas use from AD are positive options for raising awareness of AD in the UK. Challenges to these options and possible solutions to the challenges were also identified and discussed.

Publication metadata

Author(s): Duruiheoma FI, Burek CV, Bonwick GA, Alexander R

Publication type: Article

Publication status: Published

Journal: Journal of Environment & Ecology

Year: 2014

Volume: 5

Issue: 2

Pages: 258-275

Online publication date: 31/12/2014

Acceptance date: 11/12/2014

Date deposited: 26/10/2018

ISSN (electronic): 2157-6092

Publisher: Macrothink Institute

URL: https://doi.org/10.5296/jee.v5i2.6366

DOI: 10.5296/jee.v5i2.6366

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