Social impact and social acceptance. What is the reaction of the Belgian population to alternative fuels and renewable energy?

Details

Supervisors

Contino, Francesco

Degree label

Master [120] : ingénieur civil en science des données, à finalité spécialisée

Abstract

In a world where people are becoming more and more aware of environmental problems, changes in human energy consumption are inevitable. The transportation sector is currently responsible for about 23% of greenhouse gas emissions in Belgium making it an important sector to a focal point. To be more precise, this thesis focuses on the Belgian population’s social impact and social acceptance of alternative fuels and renewable energy. To centralize research, Brussels and Wallonia were chosen as the target area to determine the level of acceptance of hydrogen cars. The goal is to develop a model to determine the most interesting policies that give the best social acceptance to a group of people. Furthermore, the objective is to identify a profile type for buyers that would potentially be interested in purchasing a hydrogen car. Analyzing social acceptance represents a sizable challenge and it is imperative to have a wide range of data to build a model and draw conclusions. Most people remain skeptical about the conventional car as a possible solution to environmental problems and search for an alternative solution. Although most respondents are aware of hydrogen as an energy source, they feel they have inadequate or limited knowledge of this subject. 75% of the population does not believe that hydrogen is a renewable resource although a small majority think that it would go some way to managing environmental problems. There is much confusion about this, and the public would like to be better informed about it. Another critical factor that is crucial if this new technology is accepted, is for relevant and adequate infrastructures to be put in place.