Standard Grant: Forest Fuels: Equity, Environment, and Woody Biomass Energy Technologies in Michigan

Northern Michigan University, Marquette MI

Investigators

Abstract

This award supports a collaborative research project that examines the socio-ecological implications of differently-scaled woody biomass energy technologies in Michigan, including residential woodstoves, community-scale boilers, and biomass power plants. The project will provide deeper understandings of the social acceptability of using wood for energy in Michigan. Having a more nuanced understanding of the cultural carrying capacity for woody biomass energy systems will help policy-makers determine which technologies may be appropriate for particular landscapes and communities. The results of this research are to be disseminated broadly though professional activities with Michigan's Statewide Wood Energy Team and the national Alliance for Green Heat, media outreach activities such as regional radio, and newspaper interviews. The project will also provide opportunities for training undergraduate students in historical and social science research methods, including the design and implementation of interviews, documentary analysis, focus groups, and surveys. This collaborative research project will use new approaches for thinking about the relationship between renewable energy development and environmental justice. It combines spatial analysis with approaches from science and technology studies (STS) and environmental history to understand how these different technologies have distributed benefits and burdens since the late twentieth century. It will use multiple methods including archival analysis, semi-structured interviews, a survey, and spatial analyses, to investigate the sociopolitical factors that have led to adoption of biofuel technologies. By combining historical research, quantitative social science methods, and spatial analysis, this project will help to reveal how political and social dynamics from the past constrain technological development in the future. Researchers will communicate the results of the research through scholarly publications, public outreach efforts, and instructional activities in their classrooms. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.