Suchergebnisse

Abstract The motivation for this dissertation stems from the energy industry product development, where the solid fuel combustion technology development can take a long-time. During the long development time, the external market conditions behind the initial investment decisions may change. The external market environment includes factors such as CO2-price in European emission trading system, environmental regulations, and also public acceptance influencing political decision-making, and regulatory environment development. The negative change in these factors can cause delayed or abandoned product market deployment in the end of product development cycle. The objective of this dissertation is to clarify the factors that affect technology management and deployment in the energy industry, and to gain understanding how digital market environment monitoring tools, namely opinion mining could be used to support technology strategy process. The specific interest is on bigdata analysis, and the acceptance of energy technologies. The principal results indicate that constant market environment monitoring can be utilised to see change in factors behind the investment decisions. This may enable making alterations to the chosen product development path within the existing realities. The carbon capture and storage specific case indicates that public acceptance of technology is one of the important factors. The factors influencing technology market deployment were mainly external market factors, such as CO2-price, lack of regulations and public acceptance, including perceived stakeholder risk towards the CO2 end-storage. The created new understanding enables actors in the energy technology sector to better account for public acceptance in the technology development and deployment considerations. ; Tiivistelmä Tämä väitöskirja käsittelee energiateollisuuden tuotekehitystä, missä kiinteän polttoaineen polttotekniikan kehittäminen voi viedä pitkän aikaa, jopa kymmeniä vuosia. Pitkän tuotekehityksen aikana ulkoinen liiketoimintaympäristö, johon alkuperäinen investointipäätös on perustunut, on voinut muuttua. Ulkoinen liiketoimintaympäristö sisältää tekijöitä kuten hiilidioksidin hinta EUn päästökaupassa, ympäristölainsäädäntö ja teknologian yleinen hyväksyttävyys, joka vaikuttaa poliittiseen päätöksentekoon ja sitä kautta uuteen ympäristölainsäädäntöön. Negatiivinen muutos näissä tekijöissä voi johtaa viivästyneeseen tai täysin estyneeseen tuotteen kaupallistumiseen tuotekehityssyklin loppupäässä. Väitöskirjan tavoite on selvittää tuotekehitykseen vaikuttavia tekijöitä energia-alalla, ja tuottaa tietämystä siitä, miten digitaalisilla markkinaympäristön seurantatyökaluilla, etenkin mielipidelouhinnalla, voidaan tukea teknologiastrategiaprosessia. Erityinen fokusalue on bigdata-analytiikka ja energiateknologioiden yleinen hyväksyttävyys. Päätutkimustulokset liittyvät jatkuvaan liiketoimintaympäristön seurantaan, jota voidaan käyttää investointipäätösten taustalla olevien tekijöiden muuttumisen seurantaan. Tavoitteena on tehdä lähes reaaliaikaisia muutoksia valittuun tuotekehityspolkuun. Hiilidioksidin talteenoton ja varastoinnin tapauksessa erityisesti yleisen hyväksyttävyyden rooli korostui. Teknologian markkinoille tulon esteitä olivat etupäässä ulkoisen markkinaympäristön tekijät, kuten hiilidioksidin matala hinta, regulaatioiden puute ja yleinen hyväksyttävyys, jossa korostui varastointiin liittyvä sidosryhmäriski. Uusi tutkimustieto auttaa energiasektorin toimijoita ottamaan paremmin huomioon teknologian yleisen hyväksyttävyyden teknologian kehittämisessä ja markkinoille tulossa.

Abstract A social media (SoMe) firestorm can present a liability for personal brands via the loss of reputation, as well as for the organisational brand image. The drastic measures often taken in these situations, especially in cases of negative media attention or a scandal, usually involve dismissal of the related persons. Hence, predicting, monitoring, analysing and measuring SoMe firestorms related to organisations or individuals can be beneficial. This paper describes SoMe firestorms and their effect, using media analysis involving opinion mining. The analysis focuses on the human trash (ihmisroska) scandal that was caused by a local centre party politician in Finland. The politician caused a SoMe firestorm by describing homeless people and substance addicts as 'human trash'. The analysis utilises machine learning to classify 3300 media hits in the Finnish language to analyse their sentiment during the SoMe firestorm. General conclusions are drawn about the spread and influence of the SoMe firestorm to form a basis for wider global generalisation. The study formulates a scale for quantifying and analysing the influence of SoMe firestorms. The scale includes three classes relating to the exponential rise of the effect, starting from 1, with 3 being the highest. This scale aligns with the literature, which states that these events usually follow the same pattern. The case example provides further direction for the presented 1–3 level scale.

Abstract This article discusses the market potential estimation results at different stages of second-generation oxy-fuel technology for carbon capture and storage, where oxygen content is increased in order to increase efficiency and product life cycle. The article highlights the challenges to commercializing an energy technology with long development lead times. Challenges related to external market environment, regulations and market price for carbon dioxide (CO₂) also need to be resolved. The study is based on a second-generation oxy-CFB technology evaluation, SWOT analysis and product life-cycle estimation. The commercialization of second-generation oxy-fuel technology, estimated as a basis of oxy-CFB technology, is largely found to be dependent on technical, sociological and economical aspects related to the energy market environment. The CO₂ price in European Union (EU) emissions trading is currently below 10 €/ton, which does not favour investment in CCS. CO₂ storage also faces public opposition and EU directive limitations. The CO₂ price needs to be in the range of 30 €/ton by 2030, the estimated time of commercialization. Technological development or subsidies would also be required for the second-generation oxy-CFB power production concept to become viable. This is one of the critical factors in market deployment as the price development is influenced by several external factors, including the EU's environmental policy, politics and public acceptance.