Penalty or Premium of Foreign Ownership? Support for Waste-to-Energy Plants

• In Event: Experimental Methods in Global Environmental Politics

Abstract

Some industrial projects create environmental and health risks for local communities. Does the risk perception of community members depend on who owns and operates these projects? We examine the issue in the context of waste-to-energy (WtE) technology which uses plastic waste as a fuel to generate electricity. WtE plants eliminate the physical burden of plastic waste and reduce various types of local pollution caused by landfills, including soil and underground water, which have a detrimental effect on local wildlife and humans. However, WtE plants create environmental and health risks because burning plastic waste creates local air pollution and toxins that harm human health. Hence, residents trade off one type of pollution for another.

Might perceptions of environmental and health risks that WtE plants pose depend on whether these plants are managed by a local company or by multinationals? Moreover, do local residents perceive that multinationals from some countries (such as Japan) adopt higher standards of pollution control (and pose lower environmental risk) in relation to other countries (such as China)? Might perceptions about the overall Japanese engineering excellence influence perceptions about the safety of WtE plants? Further, because multinationals often replicate the practices of their home countries, might perceptions about environmental risks posed by Japanese/Chinese WtE plants depend on perceptions local residents have about environmental quality and pollution control in Japan/China?

Substantively, our paper focuses on an important global policy challenge of plastic waste. Across the world, the growing volumes of single-use plastics pose a challenge for local waste management systems. While landfills have been a convenient and cheap way for plastic disposal, there is less space to build new landfills to manage the growing volume of plastic waste. Several countries are considering WtE technology, as an alternative and reliable waste management system. In addition to generating electricity, WtEs addresses multiple local pollution problems. Yet, it creates new environmental and health risks at the local level and contributes to greenhouse emissions at the global level.

To examine the effect of local versus foreign ownership on local support for WtE plants, we will administer a survey-embedded experiment in Thailand (N=2000). We selected Thailand because, in addition to having about 40 WTe plants, the Thai government is promoting the construction of new WtE plants. In our framing experiment, we will randomly assign respondents to three groups. The first (reference) group will receive information that WtE plants use locally developed technology and will be operated by local Thai companies. The second group will receive the information that WtE plants use Japanese technology and will be operated by Japanese companies. The third group will receive information that WtE plants use Chinese technology and will be operated by Chinese companies.

Our dependent variable is respondents’ support for the construction of a new WtE in their local community. We hypothesize that respondents will be more supportive of new plants operated by Japanese companies but less supportive of plants operated by Chinese companies (both in comparison with the reference category). To explore the causal mechanisms, we will ask questions about perceptions of technological/engineering excellence of different countries, trust in local law enforcement, perceptions about the quality of environmental standards in Japan and China, and perceptions of local and multinational companies’ compliance with environmental laws.

In addition, we will explore heterogeneity in public preference for the construction of WtE plants based on socioeconomic variables (age, income, gender, religion, ideology). Further, we will examine how exposure to existing WtE plants and landfills (we have geocoded this data) and perceptions of the pollution they cause influence support levels. We expect that respondents living in the vicinity of existing WtE plants and those living near existing landfills will be more supportive of WtE plants.

Authors

• Azusa Uji, Kyoto University

• Jaehyun Song, Kansai University

• Nives Dolsak, University of Washington

• Aseem Prakash, University of Washington