Understanding the substance and diversity of public attitudes towards energy transitions and new energy technologies is an important consideration in building responsible innovation and developing policy/regulation. This seminar will demonstrate how big text data sets can be analysed using text mining techniques. Angus will present work examining media coverage of coal seam gas (CSG) and public submissions to the recent scientific inquiry into hydraulic fracturing (fracking) in the Northern Territory. It will demonstrate how computational methods can help to reveal discursive relationships among actors as well as topic-specific trends and patterns over space and time.
This seminar will be followed by an interactive roundtable discussion on public perceptions and policy dimensions on energy transitions and emerging energy technologies.
This roundtable includes Angus Veitch, alongside Dr Lynette Molyneaux (UQ Advance Queensland Research Fellow), Professor Peta Ashworth (UQ Chair in Sustainable Energy Futures), and Dr Daniel Roberts (Leader, Hydrogen Energy Systems Future Science Platform).
Dr Angus Veitch is a postdoctoral researcher in the School of Management at RMIT University, where he is researching the social dimensions of hydrogen and other low-carbon fuels as part of the Future Fuels CRC. He completed his PhD at UQ on the contributions of topic modelling to social science research using coal seam gas as a case study.
This event is a joint initiative of the UQ Centre for Policy Futures and CSIRO.
