Speakers
Description
Keywords: Power-to-X; Participatory planning; Citizen readiness; Place-based transitions
From technical readiness to citizen readiness: Introducing citizens’ voices in local energy transition processes
Introduction and research problem
The transition towards renewable energy and new energy infrastructure is increasingly shaping the future of today's ports. As central nodes for the production, distribution, and use of energy and green E-fuels, ports are becoming important sites for Power-to-X (PtX) and other forms of energy transition. Much attention in these transitions focuses on technological feasibility, infrastructure capacities, regulation, and economic viability. However, new energy infrastructure is also being implemented in existing places with long histories, established relationships, local identities, and prior experiences of development and change.
This raises an important planning question: what does it mean for a place and its citizens to be ready for an energy transition?
Port transitions are not neutral technological interventions. Ports have historically played key local economic and social roles, serving as industrial and often contested spaces. Different actors experience the same port differently: authorities see it as a set of diverse activities and responsibilities; citizens view it as intertwined with daily life (Figure 1). Concerns around noise, traffic, safety, or environmental impacts are often linked to the port overall, not specific activities or technologies.
Figure 1: The two different perspectives of the port
The introduction of PtX therefore goes beyond optimising or decarbonising an existing energy system. It can transform place, bringing new infrastructure, activities, risks, and visions of the future. Such transformations occur amid uncertainty: citizens may not know what the future port will look like, which technologies will ultimately be implemented, how responsibilities will be distributed, or what consequences the transformation may have for their everyday lives.
This abstract argues that planning for energy transitions therefore needs to complement existing understandings of technical, infrastructural and institutional readiness with a stronger focus on citizen readiness. Citizen readiness is not understood as public acceptance of a predetermined technological solution. Rather, it refers to the social, cultural and institutional conditions that enable citizens to understand, trust, engage with and navigate an uncertain transformation of their local environment.
Drawing on a case study of the transition towards PtX at Rønne Harbour, Denmark, the paper asks: How can participatory planning help navigate and activate change in place-based technological transformations, and what can a focus on citizen readiness reveal about the conditions for trust and local understanding in port-based energy transitions?
Conceptual and theoretical framework
Energy transitions have traditionally been approached through a technological lens, but recent research highlights the importance of socio-technical perspectives that capture interactions among technologies, infrastructures, institutions, policies, markets, and actors. These perspectives have helped move beyond a purely technological understanding of transition and show that technological change is embedded in wider social and institutional systems.
However, the role of citizens and local communities can remain less visible when readiness is discussed primarily in terms of technological feasibility, infrastructure, policy frameworks, or market conditions. In planning practice, citizen involvement may then be introduced to communicate an already defined transition, secure legitimacy, or address public concerns.
This paper suggests citizen readiness should be an integral part of transition planning (Figure 2). The concept does not imply that citizens need to be technically prepared or that participation must lead to consensus on technology. Instead, citizen readiness is about whether the conditions allow citizens to engage with uncertain futures and for transition actors to acknowledge and address local knowledge, concerns, and expectations.
Figure 2: The latter of readiness
This perspective draws on participatory and collaborative planning and design approaches, which understand planning as a process in which different forms of knowledge, interests and understandings of place are brought into dialogue. From this perspective, participation is not simply a mechanism for collecting opinions. It can constitute a space where different understandings of a place and its possible futures are articulated, negotiated and potentially transformed.
Trust is crucial in this process, especially under technological uncertainty. It isn't just about providing technical info but also about trusting that info is timely and reliable, responsibilities are clear, concerns are addressed, and dialogue is ongoing. Trust here is a relational condition for managing uncertainty and staying engaged with change.
The paper consequently conceptualises citizen readiness as emerging at the intersection of local understanding, future-oriented communication, institutional continuity and trust. Rather than replacing existing understandings of technical or infrastructural readiness, citizen readiness is proposed as a complementary dimension that can help identify the social conditions under which technological transitions can become embedded in particular places.
Methods
This research is based on a qualitative case study of Rønne Harbour on the Danish island of Bornholm, where the development of PtX and related green energy infrastructure is part of broader ambitions for the green transition and port development.
The research combines several qualitative methods. First, the research conducted semi-structured interviews with relevant actors involved in developing, planning, and communicating the port transition in Rønne. These interviews provided insight into different understandings of the port, the transition, and concerns about future development.
Second, the research included a participatory workshop with local citizens. The workshop was designed to create spaces where citizens could articulate concerns, discuss uncertainties and explore what they considered necessary for trustworthy communication about the future development of the harbour. Rather than treating participation as a final consultation stage, the process investigated how local knowledge and experiences could inform the planning and communication of an ongoing transition.
Third, media coverage was mapped to provide insight into how the development of the harbour and the transition towards PtX had been publicly represented and discussed over time. This was particularly relevant for understanding how previous events and public narratives shaped contemporary expectations and concerns.
Interview material was coded thematically. The emerging themes were subsequently brought back into the participatory process, allowing the research to move iteratively between empirical analysis and engagement with citizens. This approach made it possible to examine not only what citizens were concerned about, but also how they articulated, negotiated, and translated these concerns into principles for future communication and engagement.
Results
The analysis demonstrates that citizen concerns about port-based energy transitions cannot be reduced to a lack of technical information. Concerns were connected to broader questions of responsibility, safety, transparency, previous experiences with harbour development, and uncertainty about the port’s future role and character. The findings therefore suggest that local readiness is closely connected to whether citizens can understand not only what technology is being introduced, but also why the transition is taking place, how it may affect the place and who is responsible for its consequences.
The participatory process identified four interconnected principles for communicating and engaging around the future development of Rønne Harbour: storytelling, future outlook, stability and local ambassadors.
Figure 3: The four interconnected communication principles
Together, these findings suggest that citizen readiness is not a fixed characteristic of a community. Planning processes, relationships, and forms of communication produce and reproduce it. Importantly, the aim is not necessarily to move citizens from concern to acceptance. Rather, the participatory process can create conditions in which concern becomes articulated knowledge, uncertainty becomes something that can be collectively navigated, and trust can develop despite continued disagreement.
Discussion and conclusion
The paper contributes to discussions of energy transitions and participatory planning by arguing that the question of readiness must be expanded beyond the technical, infrastructural and institutional dimensions of transition. In place-based energy transitions, the social conditions of transformation matter as much as the technical, infrastructural and institutional dimensions.
The case of Rønne Harbour shows that citizens encounter PtX not as an abstract technological system but as part of a place with history, identity, existing relationships and prior experiences of change. Consequently, planning for technological transitions also entails planning for transformations of place. Citizen participation can make these different understandings visible and bring local knowledge into processes often dominated by technical expertise.
The concept of citizen readiness is proposed to make this dimension more explicit. It does not suggest that citizens should be made “ready” for a technological transition through communication or that participation should secure public acceptance. Instead, it asks whether planning processes create the conditions for citizens and transition actors to engage with uncertainty, develop shared understandings and maintain trust while the future remains open.
This also points to a broader challenge for planning practice. In highly technical transition processes, technical knowledge can easily become privileged over experiential, cultural and place-based knowledge. Yet implementing a technological transition depends not only on whether a technology works, but also on whether it can become embedded in the social and spatial context in which it is introduced.
The Rønne case therefore suggests that participatory planning can play a role not merely in responding to resistance after technological decisions have been made, but in activating and shaping transition pathways from the outset. Bringing citizens' voices into transition planning can reveal social and cultural conditions that technical assessments alone struggle to capture.
While the findings emerge from a specific port and a specific PtX context, the implications extend beyond energy transitions. Similar questions arise when planning for transformations in mobility, housing, infrastructure, climate adaptation and other areas where technological and spatial change intersect with everyday life. The paper concludes that planning for transformative change requires attention not only to whether technologies and infrastructures are ready, but also to whether the relationships, knowledge and forms of trust necessary to navigate change are being developed alongside them.
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