Baumann, Manuel

Boavida, N.

Dura, H.

Fautz, C.

Lichtner, P.

English

KITopen

TAGUNGSBERICHTESeite 110 Technikfolgenabschätzung – Theorie und Praxis 21. Jg., Heft 3, Dezember 2012 sind. Die beteiligten Interessengruppen konnten frei gewählt werden. Dieses Rollenspiel sollte die interne Perspektive eines TA-Wissenschaft-lers vom Vormittag zu einer externen Perspekti-ve ausweiten, um zu erkennen, ob weitere Kri-terien zu ergänzen sind. Diese neu hinzugekom-menen Kriterien wurden anschließend erneut allen vorgestellt.Zum Schluss wurden die von allen Gruppen gesammelten Kriterien noch einmal in der Ge-meinschaft diskutiert, identische Kriterien ge-bündelt und „verwandte“ Kriterien zu Gruppen wie politische Relevanz, Technologiebezug, in-terne und externe Ressourcen, benötigter Input, zu erzielender Output, Impact etc. zusammenge-fasst. Zu allen Kategorien wurden gemeinschaft-lich Leitfragen entwickelt, die bei den einzelnen Kriterien von Interesse sind. Beim Kriterium „politische Relevanz“ wurden beispielsweise folgende Fragen vorgeschlagen: Ist das Thema auf der politischen Agenda? Sollte es dort sein? Besteht Bedarf für politische Handlung? Welche Handlungsoptionen gibt es? Wie ist der Stand der Gesetzgebung? Ist eine Anpassung der Gesetzge-bung erforderlich? Der am Vortag dokumentierte Kriterienka-talog mit den Leitfragen wurde am letzten Work-shoptag noch einmal auf seine Praktikabilität überprüft. Anhand eines weiteren Themas (wie Robotik, Synthetische Biologie, Klimawandel, Kernenergie) sollten die am Vortag gebildeten Gruppen die Liste noch einmal durcharbeiten und bei Bedarf Fragen umformulieren, Zuordnungen verändern, Prioritäten tauschen und Dopplungen streichen. Diese Diskussionen wurden erneut al-len Teilnehmern vorgestellt.Die vorgeschlagenen Änderungen wurden durch die Gruppen unmittelbar nach dem Work-shop noch einmal in eine endgültige Fassung überführt, aus der die Workshopleitung eine ge-meinschaftliche Fassung erstellt und allen Teil-nehmern für die Arbeit in der eigenen Institution zur Verfügung gestellt hat.3	 FazitIm Rahmen des Workshops hat sich gezeigt, dass die beteiligten Institutionen trotz ihrer Verschie-denheit viele Gemeinsamkeiten hinsichtlich ihrer TA-Themen besitzen. Zum einen werden Themen wie Gesundheit, Nahrungssicherung, Nanotech-nologie und Partizipation in vielen Einrichtungen behandelt, auch wenn meist unterschiedliche Teil-aspekte und Fragestellungen eine Rolle spielen. Zum anderen ist die Wahl der Themen von ähnli-chen internen und externen Rahmenbedingungen abhängig, die in den verschiedenen Einrichtun-gen jedoch unterschiedlich stark Einfluss auf die Themenwahl nehmen. Es gab Konsens darüber, dass es sich meist um eine Kombination von Kri-terien handelt, die die Themenwahl beeinflusst und dass man hierbei von einem dynamischen Prozess sprechen muss, bei dem es Interaktionen zwischen den einflussnehmenden Faktoren gibt.Das Feedback der Teilnehmer zum Work-shop war sehr positiv. Für mich persönlich gab es zwei Höhepunkte bei dieser Veranstaltung; zum einen das Sichtbarmachen und Erkennen von Kri-terien, die einen bei der täglichen Arbeit beein-flussen, jedoch eher auf eine unbewusste Weise, und zum anderen die gewonnenen Einblicke in die unterschiedlichen Sichtweisen und Erscheinungs-formen von TA und im Speziellen der persönliche Kontakt zur europäischen TA-Community.“Renewable Energy Systems”:Role and Use of Parliamentary Techno-logy AssessmentLiège,	Belgium,	June	25–28,	2012by	Manuel	Baumann,	Patrick	Lichtner,	Nuno	Boavida,	Camillo	Fautz,	and	Hanna	Dura,	ITASThe summer school “Renewable Energy Sys-tems: Role and Use of Parliamentary Technol-ogy Assessment” was the first European Summer School with a pure focus on technology assess-ment. The aim of the three-day long PACITA summer school was to create awareness of the potential of technology groups in Europe. There-fore, the summer school involved keynotes, prac-tical exercises, mutual reflection, cutting edge training and networking to deal with the theme of renewable energy systems out of the perspective of TA, to meet transition objectives or to criti-cally assess energy technologies.TAGUNGSBERICHTETechnikfolgenabschätzung – Theorie und Praxis 21. Jg., Heft 3, Dezember 2012  Seite 1111	 OrganizationThe summer school was organized by the SPIRAL Research Centre of the Department of Political Science at the University of Liège and took place at Château de Colonster situated outside Liège in the hillside. Each day consisted of commonly at-tended plenary sessions and applied workshops made up of two fixed smaller groups. The work-shops were hosted by expert TA practitioners and members of the PACITA consortium, who were also supervising the training sessions and assisting all participants at all stages. Each morning started with a keynote speech followed by a workshop session, with the same sequence repeated in the afternoons. One of the main intentions of the orga-nizers, besides imparting knowledge about PTA, was to enable a high level of networking. This was also achieved by offering two dinners and two im-pressive sightseeing tours of Liège.2	 Lectures	and	PresentationsThe summer school included four lectures which provided the basics for the following workshop sessions.The first lecture consisted of a brief intro-duction to technology assessment held by Johan Evers, project manager at the Institute Society and Technology, Brussels. The introduction first gave a general overview of TA (stakeholders, TA modes and functions, etc.) because the par-ticipants were an international mix of individuals with different backgrounds that were not, or only partially, related to TA. Later on in his presen-tation, Johan Evers focused on renewables, PTA and energy technology assessment within Eu-rope. He concluded that TA was a socio-technical tool that could significantly assist in providing inspirational, best available and relevant knowl-edge of different stakeholders in society.The next lecture “The Problem Definition and the Research Design in TA: The Case of E-Mobility” was held by António Moniz (ITAS). The first question during this session was how a specific problem has to be addressed and defined in order to become a subject of TA. Another ques-tion focused on clarifying whether ecological awareness and the energy problem could be cov-ered by TA. Several TA cases were presented and discussed (POST, STOA, TAB, NSF, and DBT). The issue of TA-specific problem definition was explained with the example of electric mobility. The example proved helpful to understand the related scientific approach based on TA and how to use different research designs (exploratory, de-scriptive, causal) and methods (citizen consulta-tion, stakeholder involvement, expert analysis, etc.). Finally, two controversial cases were dis-cussed in the lecture: the Karlsruhe tram-train system and the Portuguese MOBI.E program.The third lecture “The Method Toolbox for Technology Assessment: From Science to Dia-logue” was held on the second day by Danielle Bütschi from the Swiss Center for Technology Assessment (TA-SWISS). The aim of the lecture was to present the variety of commonly used TA methods and included the presentation of three classes of TA (scientific TA methods, communi-cation TA methods and interactive methods). Af-ter explaining different methods within the three TA classes (scientific TA methods: Delphi survey, scenario-based analysis, etc.), the lecture focused on the question how to pick the right method. The choice of the right method depends on various factors, such as the institutional setting, the issue to be assessed, the political and social context as well as the development stage of the technology in question, etc. One recommendation was to de-sign a TA project using an individualized method and not to apply an existent TA method. The TA toolbox also varies depending on the respective institution and can be filled with innovative tools.The lecture “Communication Work and the Strive for Impact” by Jurgen Ganzevles (Rathenau Institute, The Netherlands) focused on effective communication of TA results to society. During the lecture different basic communication models and related communication obstacles were presented. Jurgen Ganzevles then focused on communication work and the impacts of various communication tools. These can be products (e.g. reports, books, etc.), targeted approaching (e.g. parliamentary ex-pert meetings or Knowledge Chambers at minis-tries, etc.) or broad campaigning (e.g. launching events, opinion articles, radio and television, etc.). Illustrations from the “Energy in 2030” project of the Rathenau Institute were given for a better un-derstanding of communication impacts. The final TAGUNGSBERICHTESeite 112 Technikfolgenabschätzung – Theorie und Praxis 21. Jg., Heft 3, Dezember 2012 conclusions were that facts and opinions have to be translated carefully into policy relevance, that broad campaigning is a way to attract the attention of politicians, and that there should be substantial media training and coaching of TA researchers.The final presentation was titled “Conclud-ing Remarks from a Non-PTA Country: Insights and Future Directions” and was held by Paidi O´Reilly (University College Cork, Ireland). He started with a general introduction to PTA within Europe (diversity in the TA landscape, differenc-es in models) and then presented a valuable over-view of the PTA situation in different European countries (e.g. classification of PTA institutions in different countries into parliamentary commit-tees, parliamentary offices/units or independent institutes etc.). At the end of his lecture, O´Reilly addressed three questions that are strongly relat-ed to the workshop aims and exercises: • How should Ireland and other non-PTA coun-tries institutionalize TA? • What is the “business case” for such a TA in-stitution? • What should Ireland and other non-PTA countries learn from existing TA institutions?The presentation finished with a discussion of factors effecting the further institutionalization of TA in Ireland. The central questions concerned the institutional setting (e.g. parliamentary vs. non-parliamentary TA, etc.) and structure and state of the innovation process (e.g. state- vs. market-driven innovation etc.).3	 WorkshopsThe workshop groups were separated into two different tasks, named “Global Citizens on Re-newables” and “Renewables for Cities”. Each group was hosted by an expert and had to briefly present its results after every workshop session to all other participants in the auditorium. Addi-tionally, among the participants of each workshop three were drawn by lot and then endowed with special tasks to facilitate the actions of the work-shop and summarize the outcomes of each day. The aim of the workshops was to develop a TA institution and to elaborate a TA project on e.g. renewables in cities in a non-PTA country. Thus, the first step was to build a scenario for renew-ables, choosing a non-PTA country and city. In this case, the city of Sofia in Bulgaria was chosen to setup the project. After that, appropriate tech-nologies for use in urban areas had to be specified and chosen (photovoltaic power generation). The different exercises in the workshop were based not only on the defined scenario but also on the lectures given before, including e.g. defining the problem (why renewables in cities), establishing a business and a working plan, and developing a method to integrate different stakeholders, a com-munication plan, etc. The workshops made a great contribution to a better understanding of the dif-ficulties and complexity of a TA process and the problems that may arise. At the end of the sum-mer school, all results of the two working groups and their individual sessions were summarized and combined to a full TA process in a final pre-sentation, including a short news announcement as well as an interview with the “spokesperson”. The final results were then collectively discussed, which helped the participants to experience the problems that can occur in a TA process.4	 ConclusionSome of the highlights of the summer school were the excellent organization and the dynam-ic, interactive concept which was well adapted to the variety of participants with diverse back-grounds. Our local hosts demonstrated a strong personal commitment and burning joy to making this summer school a lasting and valuable event for all. The lectures were of good quality and ap-propriate content, providing a good overview and relevant examples of TA within Europe related to renewable energies. The interactive workshop concept proved adequate to give an introduc-tion to TA processes and to help understanding their development by going through each steps in practice. The chosen format fostered a spontane-ously creative and very vivid output generation in the group. The additional evening program in-duced an enriching group dynamic, which made it easy to discuss and work in a comfortable but still professional atmosphere combined with a strong exchange of ideas and insights across the disciplines and nationalities.

“Renewable Energy Systems”: Role and Use of Parliamentary Technology Assessment. Liège, Belgium, June 25 - 28, 2012

https://publikationen.bibliothek.kit.edu/1000101030/53708732

“Renewable Energy Systems”: Role and Use of Parliamentary Technology Assessment. Liège, Belgium, June 25 - 28, 2012

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