Energy security resilience and risk is of increasing, if not primary, importance in UK energy policy and elsewhere. Nonetheless it is a poorly defined and under-researched concept within public risk perception. Thus, this paper will synthesise insights from existing research to draw conclusions about public conceptions and perceptions of energy security risks at both national and personal levels. The analysis will be based on quantitative and qualitative data from three projects examining public perceptions of energy systems and transitions (e.g. Butler et al., 2013; Demski et al., 2011, 2014, 2015).
Early research on public perceptions of energy security has found that people are highly concerned about a number of aspects such as dependence on other countries and the reduced availability of fossil fuels. As such, public risk perception appears to be high. However, people also express feelings of uncertainty associated with judgements about energy security risks, specifically when energy security is conceptualised at more abstract or national (rather than personal) levels. Furthermore, risk perceptions appear to be much lower for concrete conceptualisations of energy security, e.g. our UK respondents did not expect electricity or gas shortages that might affect their everyday use of energy.
Other research focusing on the personal use of energy has shown that people think about energy in a way that indicates it is perceived as a social good, i.e. necessary for living a healthy life. In line with this, people express the belief that energy accessibility and affordability should and will be guaranteed to them. This type of public discourse diverges from UK policy framings of energy provision and security, which discuss energy as a commodity and encourage consumers to act accordingly (e.g. search for best deals and energy providers).
Taken together these findings have a number of potential implications. Specifically, implications for attributions of responsibility (e.g. who has to ensure energy security), perceived control (i.e. the extent to which people feel they can do something about energy security), resilience (e.g. the extent to which people engage in behaviours that ensure they are resilient to future energy outages or price hikes) and decision-making (e.g. the behaviours people engage in to ensure energy availability as well as the way policies are designed by government). These and other emerging themes will be analysed to enrich our understanding of public perceptions of energy security risks and discuss potential futures lines of research.