Table 1 Overview of PESTEL and SWOT/TOWS categories/codes (adapted from [7, 27, 28])
Factor category | General description | Examples with regard to ICCs |
|---|---|---|
PESTEL | Method of strategic management to analyse the macro-environment | |
Political (P) | Role of state/government (“guiding”) | Governmental subsidies, consumer incentives, taxation regulations, trade barriers |
Economic (E) | Macro-economic perspective | Prices of alternative products, economic growth (rate), number of jobs, exchange rates, taxation, competition, resource availability, number of plants and their capacities, life cycle costing, pre-treatment costs vs. feedstock prices (biomass specifications – strong link to the factor category “technological”on the left side) |
Social (S) | Changing cultures and demographics | Changes in social thinking, consumer convenience, population growth, income distribution |
Technological (T) | Innovations | Cost comparison of plants, number of different technologies, fields of research and their costs, new products/processes/materials – innovations, flexibility of plants and feedstock, product life cycles, governmental research expenditures, biomass specifications (pre-treatment costs vs. feedstock prices—strong link to the factor category “economic” on the left side) |
Ecological (E) | “Green” issues concerning the natural environment (like environmental pollution, generating waste, sustainability criteria etc.) | Advantages and disadvantages of ICCs compared to conventional heating fuels, cultivation criteria, waste/residues, life cycle assessments |
Legal (L) | Statutory restrictions/changes (“restricting”) | Statutory requirements for ICCs or for the end-products produced from ICCs (on the downstream side of the supply chain) |
SWOT/TOWS | Framework used in the strategic planning of an organisation or product | |
Internal strength (S) | Enabler | Internal factors supporting the market uptake, e.g., technology advantages, feedstock flexibility, cost-efficiency |
Internal weakness (W) | Barrier | Internal factors hindering the market uptake, e.g., technology challenges, slow upscaling, difficult storage and handling |
External opportunity (O) | Enabler | External factors supporting the market uptake, e.g., favourable policy regulations, collaborations, subsidy, quotas |
External threat (T) | Barrier | External factors hindering the market uptake, e.g., unfavourable policy regulations, rising material costs, increasing technology & feedstock competition |