Steps for Local Stakeholders and Citizens Interviews
Why collect insights from local stakeholders and citizens?
The Interview Phase is a vital part of the project, aimed at engaging two key audiences, local stakeholders and citizens, to better understand their perceptions of their cities and to assess the feasibility of implementing integrated energy strategies. Its main purpose is to gather feedback ahead of the workshops, increasing municipalities’ awareness of public views, collect essential city data (particularly important in small and medium-sized cities where information for the CET strategies may be lacking), and foster the active involvement of community members in the energy transition process.
Design and Disseminate the Survey
The first stage is to carefully prepare the questionnaire and draft a structure to make sure that useful information is collected. With the aim and target audience previously defined, the first step is to draft simple and free from ambiguity questions, choosing between various formats. Arrange the questions in a logical sequence, starting with easy and engaging ones to build interest, and then implement the questionnaire on the chosen platform for dissemination.
Tip: Before finalizing the survey, share it with colleagues for feedback, as an external perspective can help refine and improve the questionnaire.
To ensure a comprehensive engagement with community members on various aspects of clean energy transition and urban development, the questionnaire used in the PLENTY-Life project covers four domains:
Energy: Explore critical aspects of energy production, distribution, and integration within the municipality and its efforts to transition to renewable sources.
Mobility: Evaluate a city’s transportation infrastructure and efforts to promote sustainable mobility choices.
New Economy: Evaluate how the new economy involves innovative approaches to sustainable development, leveraging clean energy, and fostering resilience in urban environments.
Urban Innovation: Assess a city’s innovative solutions to environmental challenges and sustainable urban planning.
The dissemination involves choosing the most effective channels to share the survey with clear instructions to guide participants on how to complete it, along with information about deadlines and the purpose of the questionnaire. At this stage, it is also necessary to define a threshold for the minimum number of surveys that must be completed.
The following table includes the strategy used in the PLENTY-Life project for the survey dissemination.
Target | Aim | Dissemination | Data Collection |
|---|---|---|---|
Citizens | Designed to gather broad community perspectives and input on energy transition priorities and challenges. | Posters and social media posts on municipal channels. | At least 40 responses. |
Stakeholders | Focuses on detailed feedback from entities such as public bodies, ESCOs, funding agencies, regulatory bodies, social institutions, industry associations and local businesses. | Direct email contact with stakeholders, using contacts provided by the municipality. | At least 2 responses with representation from each applicable stakeholder category. |
The analysis of the replies is the final step of the process. However, it should be defined from the beginning of the project. When creating the design of the survey, the analysis should be considered simultaneously.
In the PLENTY-Life project, a Feasibility Tool was created for the analysis of the answers. The Feasibility Tool uses a Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) approach that employs a simplified weighted sum where the percentage of answers is multiplied by assigned weights. The feasibility score helps visualize the municipality’s efforts and potential in clean energy solutions, offering a structured framework for comparing and prioritizing diverse energy solutions, which is reflected as the CET score and CET compass, respectively. The score is addressed directly through the four domains (Energy, Mobility, New Economy, Urban Innovation), while the compass builds on them with identified drivers and barriers and encapsulates the importance and relevance of certain topics for the community in place. These topics are:
Economic Development: Focusing on creating jobs, stimulating local businesses, and attracting investment through the development of renewable energy.
Environmental Sustainability: Prioritizing the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, preservation of natural resources, and enhancement of biodiversity.
Community Well-being: Ensuring that the energy transition enhances the quality of life for all residents.
Energy Resilience and Security: Strengthening the community’s energy infrastructure to be more reliable and independent.
To additionally demonstrate these results to stakeholders and citizens in a simplified manner, a one-page summary highlighting the key findings from each domain was created. This summary was sent to all respondents who provided their contact information during workshops, maintaining engagement with those interested in participating in the sessions, and setting a basis for future discussions.