A case study of four biomass conversion technologies in the Netherlands

Abstract The negative impact of our current energy system on the environment, has led to the search for more renewable energy sources. Although an increase in markets for sustainable technologies has been observed, the change of the total fossil fuel regime towards sustainable energy has been very slow. To effectively stimulate the development and diffusion of renewable technologies more insight is needed regarding the underlying mechanism of such transitions. This study increases insights on transition dynamics by linking strategic decision making of individual actors to the development of a technological innovation system (TIS). For this, the concepts from the uncertainty framework by Meijer (2006) and functions of innovation system framework by Hekkert et al. (2007) are used. The key concept of this study is perceived uncertainty. Researchers have stressed the importance of perceived uncertainty as it can lead to premature termination of projects by actors thereby forming a barrier on the development of TIS. In order to determine the influence of perceived uncertainty on transitions this study analyses four biomass conversion transitions. For each transition we determine (1) the dominant perceived uncertainty, (2) the actor type involved and (3) the corresponding strategy to overcome the perceived uncertainty? and how this strategy affects the transition development. The results show that although the strategic responses to perceived uncertainty vary greatly per transition and per actor type,

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