Uncovering opinions on the unfamiliar: Investigating the attitude atmosphere around CCUS through media discourses

Carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) technologies are expected to contribute significantly to climate abatement, but the technologies have not been widely adopted and remain relatively unfamiliar to the public. Public opinions and attitudes can contribute significantly to the deployment o...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of cleaner production 2024-04, Vol.447, p.141558, Article 141558
Main Authors: Buure, K., Kainiemi, L., Levänen, J.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Attitude atmosphere
carbon
Carbon capture
Circularity
cleaning
climate
Media discourses
news media
Opinions
public opinion
social benefit
Storage and utilization
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) technologies are expected to contribute significantly to climate abatement, but the technologies have not been widely adopted and remain relatively unfamiliar to the public. Public opinions and attitudes can contribute significantly to the deployment of technologies and can be studied through discourses. Discourses can reveal underlying attitudes from widespread narratives. This paper investigates the attitude atmosphere around CCUS technologies through Finnish media discourses, building on 51 articles from 13 different national newspapers or news media sites. The findings of this research confirm that CCUS technologies are fairly unfamiliar to the public but indicate positive attitudes particularly towards carbon capture and utilization (CCU) technologies. However, information provision to the public does not necessarily translate towards increasingly positive attitudes. Communication should be genuine and focused on interaction instead of persuading the public of the benefits of the technologies. Methodologically, this paper points out that media discourses can provide possibilities to assess attitude atmospheres around unfamiliar technologies, such as CCUS. •Public opinions can have significant impact on the deployment of technologies.•Exploring attitude atmosphere around CCUS technologies.•Media discourses can unveil the opinions of the public.•Information provision should be genuine and participatory.
ISSN:0959-6526
1879-1786
DOI:10.1016/j.jclepro.2024.141558