DeliberatingtheHeatTransition

UKERC research shows that under the right conditions UK publics support a low carbon energy future. However, significant frictions can arise when changes are proposed without fully anticipating users’ non-negotiable positions and needs, social relations, or in-situ understandings.

Focusing on key UK heat decarbonisation options, this project will bring issues of energy system change, disruption and contestation into close conversation with the realm of everyday life. It will examine whether place-based community deliberation and participatory approaches can help to understand and mediate potential conflicts in domestic heat decarbonisation.

The project will:

1. Develop a theoretical framework of conditions likely to generate contestation between heat transitions and everyday temporalities
2. Test the framework by brokering co-produced understandings with stakeholders and users drawn from two examples (heat pumps in off-gas homes, district heating); (c) explore methods for bridging stakeholder knowledges and conflicts.

The project will utilise Public Engagement Observatory evidence on public engagement on heat transitions.