Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
wider regions, and the state-owned utilities face a far easier task in terms
of sharing lows between regions.
hird, in addition to the interplay of forces
within
each of the four con-
textual areas (STEP), there is interplay of forces
between
each of the four
contextual areas. For example, inluential sociocultural variables inluence
economic, political, and technological variables and positive and negative
systemic feedbacks that radiate from initial cause and efect relationships
proceed to catalyze conditions of evolutionary change throughout the
entire STEP environment. To complicate things, the direction of causal-
ity is often two-way and not necessarily positive. To illustrate, in China,
political will to abate pollution has engendered support for wind power
development and lead to policies which have fueled the emergence of a
wind turbine manufacturing industry. In the process, the economic and
job creation beneits associated with the wind turbine manufacturing
industry have begun to reinforce government support for wind power. In
short, these two variables have had a mutually reinforcing efect on each
other. As a contrasting illustration, high levels of public environmental-
ism in the Canadian province of Ontario has fostered public support for
wind power development, and this has nurtured provincial government
support for wind power. However, overly aggressive wind power develop-
ment policy has engendered NIMBY opposition, undermining the climate
of support for wind power. In short, these two variables have had negative
feedback efects on each other.
It should be clear from this analysis that too little is known about the
extensive interactions between the variables within the energy policy STEP
environment to create a prescriptive framework for guiding energy policy.
he STEP environment which afects energy policy is a complex adaptive
system. he variables which impact wind power development evolve in
response to inluences from other inluential variables within the same sys-
tem catalyzing continuous change. he interplay between these inluential
variables is so complex and contextually bound that attempts to quantify
relative inluence is highly prone to error.
2
By extension, attempts to iden-
tify universally valid truths are futile. It is for this reason that the Political
SET model should be considered to be an analytical tool, rather than a pre-
dictive framework.
he merit of the Political SET framework as an analytical tool is predi-
cated on the premise that studying the contextual STEP forces which have
most inluenced wind power development in other markets can serve as a
fundamental starting point for examining STEP forces in other countries.
Indeed, the commonalities uncovered in the six case studies in regard to
forces which inhibit or catalyze wind power development serve as evidence
