Summary This chapter explores some of the social and ethical issues related to the use of BECCS to deliver negative emissions. It considers both the ‘big questions’ related to its potential role in a ‘morally adequate’ response to climate change and the more specific social and ethical issues associated with deployment of the technology on the ground. The relationship between BECCS and the use of fossil fuels and how it sits relative to other mitigation options and in the context of other negative emissions approaches are also considered. The chapter identifies contexts in which BECCS might represent a sustainable as well as a just solution and how it might be received at a social and societal level. Reviewing current thinking on justice in the context of energy and climate change, paying particular attention to issues that are relevant to carbon capture and storage (CCS), and specifically BECCS, we look in turn at distributional, procedural, financial and intergenerational aspects of justice. Results from an expert workshop convened to discuss issues of governance and ethics in CCS and BECCS are used to supplement the wider literature throughout the chapter.
CITATION STYLE
Gough, C., Mabon, L., & Mander, S. (2018). Social and Ethical Dimensions of BECCS. In Biomass Energy with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS): Unlocking Negative Emissions (pp. 251–276). John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119237716.ch12
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