The public perception of carbon dioxide capture and storage in the UK: results from focus groups and a survey

Abstract

A series of meetings of two ‘Citizen Panels’ were held to explore public perceptions of off-shore carbon dioxide (CO₂) capture and storage (CCS). In addition, a face-to-face survey of 212 randomly selected individuals was conducted. We found that, on first hearing about CCS in the absence of any information on its purpose, the majority of people either do not have an opinion at all or have a somewhat negative perspective. However, when (even limited) information is provided on the role of CO₂ storage in reducing CO₂ emissions to the atmosphere, opinion shifts towards expressing slight support for the concept.

Support depends, however, upon concern about human-caused climate change, plus recognition of the need for major reductions in CO₂ emissions. It also depends upon CCS being seen as just one part of a wider strategy for achieving significant cuts in CO₂ emissions. A portfolio including renewable energy technologies, energy efficiency, and lifestyle change to reduce demand was generally favoured. CCS can be part of such a portfolio, but wind, wave, tidal, solar and energy efficiency were preferred. It was felt that uncertainties concerning the potential risks of CCS had to be better addressed and reduced; in particular the risks of accidents and leakage (including the potential environmental, ecosystem and human health impacts which might result from leakage).     

BOOK REVIEWS

Books reviewed in this article: Aerial Photography and Remote Sensing. Terrain Analysis and Remote Sensing . JOHN R. G. TOWNSHEND , ed. Environmental Data Use in Computer-assisted Data Handling Systems: The Results of a Survey of Applications in the Pacific Northwest States . KENNETH E. GORDON . Applied Land Use: A Spatial Approach . JOHN F. LOUNSBURY , LAWRENCE M. SOMMERS , AND EDWARD A. FERNALD , eds. The Second Battle of New Orleans: A History of the Vieux Carre Riverfront-Expressway Controversy . RICHARD O. BAUMBACH , JR. AND WILLIAM E. BORAH . Cultural Environmental Archaeology . MYRA SHACKLEY . The Immoral landscape: Female Prostitution in Western Societies . RICHARD SYMANSKI . life Among the Poor in Cairo . UNNI WIKAN , translated by Ann Henning. Women, Work and Property in Northwest India . URSULA SHARMA . The Domestication of Women: Discrimination in Developing Societies . BARBARA ROGERS Economic Optimization in Locational and Transport Analysis . A. G. WILSON , J. D. COELHO , S. M. MACGILL , H. C. W. L. WILLIAMS . New Tools for Economic Development: The Enterprise Zone, Development Bank, and RFC . GEORGE STERNLIEB AND DAVID LISTOKIN , eds. Regional Wage Inflation . R. L. MARTIN , ed. Finding A Place For Energy-Siting Coal Conversion Facilities . FRANK J. CALZONETTI WITH MARK S. ECKERT . Environmental Management, Resources, and Systems Environmentalism. Second Edition . T. O'RIORDAN . Countryside Conservation . BRYN GREEN . Medical Spatial Diffusion: An Historical Geography of Epidemics in an Island Community . A. D. CLIFF , P. HAGGETT , J. K. ORD , AND G. R. VERSEY . Philosophy and Geographic Thought Order and Skepticism: Human Geography and the Dialectic of Science . RICHARD SZYMANSKI AND JOHN A. AGNEW . Measurement of Subjective Phenomena . D. F. JOHNSTON , ed. Conceptions of Space in Social Thought: A Geographic Perspective . ROBERT DAVID SACK . The Association of American Geographers: The First Seventy-five Years: 1904-1979 . PRESTON E. JAMES AND GEOFFREY J. MARTIN . The Life and Thought of Isaiah Bowman . GEOFFREY J. MARTIN . Physical River Basin Planning: Theory and Practice . SURANJIT K. SAHA AND CHRISTOPHER J. BARROW , eds. Soils and landforms: An Integration of Ceomorphology and Pedology . A. I. GERRARD Climatic Change and Society. Consequences of Increasing Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide . WILLIAM W. KELLOGG AND ROBERT SCHWARE . Political Political Redistrictings and Geographic Theory . RICHARD L. MORRILL . Population Studies in Spanish American Population History: Dell Plain Latin American Studies NO. 8 . DAVID J. ROBINSON , ed. Population Redistribution in the Midwest . CURTIS C. ROSEMAN , ANDREW J. SOFRANKO , AND JAMES D. WILLIAMS , eds. Geographical Perspectives on the Elderly . A. M. WARNES , ed. Regional Perspective On the American South . MERLE BLACK AND JOHN SHELTON REED , eds. The Prairies and Plains: Prospects for the 80s . JOHN R. ROGGE , ed. Rural Rural Settlement in an Urban World . MICHAEL BUNCE . Social Accident at Three Mile Island: The Human Dimensions . DAVID L. SILLS , C. P. WOLF , AND VIVIEN B. SHELANSKI , eds. The American Small Town: Twentieth-Century Place Images . JOHN JAKLE . Urban A House of My Own . SUSAN LOBO . The City: Patterns and Processes in the Urban Ecosystem . CHRISTOPHER H. EXLINE , GARY L. PETERS , AND ROBERT P. LARKIN . Movement in Cities . P. W. DANIELS AND A. M. WARNES . Urbanization and Urban Planning in Capitalist Society . MICHAEL DEAR AND ALLEN J. SCOT , eds.     

Colorado’s Millennial Generation: Youth Perceptions and Experiences of Nature

Abstract

This study uses survey and focus group methods to explore attitudes toward and experiences of nature among millennial-aged students in northern Colorado. First, results confirm that young people possess a strong interest in the outdoors yet time, transportation, and new technologies hamper their ability to visit public lands and outdoor spaces. Second, respondents experience nature in ways more mediated by new technologies such as cell phones and nature DVDs. Third, citizen science and active learning show promise as techniques for returning young people to the outdoors. The challenge lies in teaching young people to reimagine the outdoors not as elsewhere or out there but as a backyard geographic space.     

Political Alienation,Rurality and the Symbolic Role of Swedish Wolf Policy

Attitudes towards wolf policy are likely to be driven by perceived differences in political power between urban and rural groups. Using Swedish survey data collected in 2014 and structural equation modeling, I evaluated the effects of political alienation. Political alienation mediated the effect of having an urban or rural place of residence on attitudes towards wolf policy. Politically alienated individuals also preferred more extreme policy options than other respondents, while being less likely to approve of the current wolf policy in Sweden. These findings suggest that political alienation drives attitude polarization in wolf related social conflicts. Awareness of these underlying power asymmetries could possibly increase both policy legitimacy and management efficiency. This highlights the importance of accounting for social context in relation to policy-making and conservation efforts related to wolves.     

The Influence of Place on the Willingness to Pay for Ecosystem Services

Sense of place, including an individual’s attitudes toward specific geographic settings, is generally predicted to influence willingness to engage in place-protective behaviors. Relatively little research, however, has empirically examined the influence of people’s attitudes toward a place on their willingness to pay for environmental protection. Using the example of a payment for ecosystem services (PES) initiative in the McKenzie River watershed, Oregon, USA, we found that place attitudes were a significant predictor of respondents’ willingness to pay for a program designed to benefit drinking water quality. These results suggest that connecting conservation actions to landscapes that are meaningful to people may increase their financial support for PES and other conservation programs. While program managers have little or no influence over stakeholders’ political ideology, gender, or income, managers may be able to influence prospective PES buyers’ awareness and attitudes through targeted communications, thereby potentially increasing support for place-based conservation efforts.     

中国地理与资源期刊集群微信公众号的发展与实践

在“互联网+”时代,微信公众号服务在社会各行业、各领域得到广泛普及,在学术传播方面,能够有效地帮助期刊传播科学文化,增加期刊与读者群之间的“粘性”,扩大期刊的学术影响力和社会知名度。本文对中国地理与资源期刊集群微信公众号的运营发展过程进行总结,同时基于微信后台数据,对微信公众号取得的实践成效进行统计分析,结果表明：① 微信公众号的创立是扩大受众范围、有效传播科学文化、提高期刊影响力的重要手段;② 微信公众号的科学定位、标题创意设计、内容创新以及广泛宣传是吸引公众、提高期刊知名度的必要举措;③ 中国地理与资源期刊集群微信公众号实践成效显著。最后从重视微信用户体验、优化平台菜单设置、增加平台与用户互动及加大宣传力度等几方面提出打造品牌微信公众号的对策建议。     

Looking for a White Male Effect in Generation Z: Race,Gender, and Political Effects on Environmental Concern and Ambivalence

The “White male effect” has been presented in past literature as a way to explain the tendency for White males to have lower environmental concern and risk perceptions than female and non-White individuals. Recently, research has proposed the “White male effect” may be a “conservative White male effect,” due to findings that political ideology impacts environmental concern. This study used a sample of young college-educated adults from Generation Z to test whether the conservative White male effect is present for environmental concern and ambivalence toward a proenvironmental worldview in this younger generation. Online surveys were distributed to undergraduate students at a large northeastern university in spring of 2016. A total of 1,940 surveys were returned. Results showed a lack of a unique White male, or conservative White male, effect above and beyond differences explained by gender, Whiteness, and political affiliation. The implications of this effect’s absence are discussed.     

中国公众对气候变化和气象灾害认知的社会性别差异

对2015年全国公众气象服务评价调查结果的分析显示,我国公众中男性对气候变化认识程度以及对气象灾害预警的认知水平和满意度都比女性高。城镇女性选择环保产品、环保出行及愿意对生活或工作方式做出改变来应对气候变化的比例高于城镇男性,而农村男性选择调整或改变种植或养殖方式、改变种植或养殖品种及转换谋生方式的比例高于女性。男性选择购买相关气象或气候保险、参加培训或辅导的比例比女性高,而女性选择学习气象灾害和气候变化相关的专业知识比例高于男性。女性对气象服务信息的需求比例比男性高。建议：1)积极推进气候变化及其灾害认知的社会性别研究,建立灾害认知性别数据库,将社会性别融入到气象灾害风险管理的整个过程;2)在气象服务中引入社会性别视角,加强针对女性的宣传和指导,开发适合女性的服务产品和信息传播渠道,提升她们应对灾害的意识和能力。     

广州市公众地理信息服务平台的设计与开发

论述了城市基础测绘部门开发公众地理信息平台的必要性和优势,分析并讨论了公共地理信息服务平台中的公众地理信息服务平台、基础地理信息服务平台和政务地理信息服务平台在数据内容、功能框架、网络体系、服务对象上的不同,以广州市公众地理信息服务平台的开发为例,详细介绍了该平台的数据内容、功能框架和系统特色,该平台对其他城市开发类似的公众地理信息服务平台具有一定的参考作用。     

地震目录三维展示在天津地震数据服务系统中的应用

地震目录是地震系统提供的重要公共服务内容之一,以震源深度为主要展示要素的地震目录三维图像,作为一种新型公共服务产品,可把地震发生的位置形象直观地展示给公众。文章详细阐述了天津地震数据服务系统中震源深度三维图和分布图的设计方法及展示效果,对其所产生的积极作用和意义进行说明,并提出未来的设计方向。