"Permitting and public acceptance is the key issue",Konstantine Staschus,Secretary-General of ENTSO-E stated at the Cigré International Symposium in Bologna,September 2011.He was talking about European market integration,electricity highways and smart grids.In order to reach the EU's ambitious goals on renewable energy,over 600 major transmission line projects are now being planned.Expansions of this kind are often strongly opposed by local environmentalists.This generates negative publicity for the power sector,prolongs casework and delays the finalising of the projects.This has major socio-economic consequences and should be avoided.The question is how the sector and the authorities can address the public in matters such as these,so that the industry gets the time it needs to finalise the projects in the given time frame.Based on experiences from Norway,this article attempts to answer this question.The observations made here are based on data on the public's view of the power industry,collected between 1997 and 2012.The surveys are carried out every three months,and show how people's attitudes towards grid expansion have changed as new projects are implemented,environmentalists have stated their points,the debate has been presented in the media,and the sector and the authorities have communicated with the population.More than 56 000 energy customers have been interviewed.The article opens with a description of the situation in Norway with regards to transmission line development and security of supply.It discusses the population's attitudes towards the general grid activity and the building of new transmission lines in particular.We will present examples where small groups of environmentalists have influenced casework and political decision-making,even if the public opinion has differed.Finally,we will assess the measures available to the sector and authorities.The purpose of the article is to provide the power industry with insights and a better understanding of the customers' attitudes and actions with regards to line development.The experiences from Norway might give important input to other countries about to launch similar projects.
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