Study 2: Polling of the passengers on a hydrogen-powered bus

Questions posed in the investigation

In Munich in summer 1997 the worldwide first bus with a hydrogen-powered engine was put into use in the city busline, through which a larger number of people came into contact with this technology. This offered the opportunity to conduct a passenger poll, in which questions similar to those in the school questionnaires were posed:

• Question 1 of the investigation:
  Does the hydrogen-powered city bus meet with acceptance on the part of the passengers?
• Question 2 of the investigation:
  Is there a relation between the acceptance of the hydrogen bus and the environmental awareness of the passengers?
• Question 3 of the investigation:

Questions on knowledge about the subject of hydrogen were ruled out in the passenger poll. For one it was feared that the passengers being questioned could not have been easily motivated to answer questions in a knowledge test. For another, there was not enough time available to confront the "mobile" test subjects with knowledge questions.

• Question 4 of the investigation:
  Is there a demand for information on hydrogen technologies on the part of the passengers? Which sources of information have the passengers used thus far?

Method

Random sample

The passenger poll was conducted with 145 persons who were riding in the hydrogen bus in the Munich busline. Every tenth person who boarded the bus was asked to answer a few questions on the subject of "Hydrogen as a fuel". Of the passengers questioned, 80 were women, 65 were men; the average age of the subjects was 40 years. The evaluation only took persons into consideration who had a strong knowledge of German.

Instrument

The situation of collecting data in public transportation requires the construction of a questionnaire which can be answered in a short amount of time. Experience shows that people in a metropole on the way to shopping, school, or work have neither the willingness nor the time to engage themselves in a lengthy interview. Therefore a short version of the questionnaire was constructed from the one given to the students (Study 1). The questions were read to the passengers and their answers were noted immediately. For ease in answering they received as an aid for the multiple-choice questions an answer scale on a piece of paper. The same scale was used for all multiple-choice questions (figure 8).

Figure 8 Answer scale for the polled passengers in the hydrogen-powered bus.

The acceptance of hydrogen-powered forms of transportation was collected with 6 items. The items were summed to a scale; this scale proved to be reliable (Cronbach's alpha > .7).

The environmental awareness was recorded in three items on environmental attitudes which also resulted in a reliable scale (Cronbach's alpha > .6).

At the start of the interview the passengers were asked to name all associations which occured to them on the subject of hydrogen. The associations were written down by the observers and categorised by two evaluators afterwards. The same category system was used as in Study 1 (chemical knowledge directly related to hydrogen and its combustion reaction, chemical knowledge indirectly related to hydrogen, hydrogen technologies, zeppelin, hydrogen bomb, threat – danger, positive assessment – environmental friendliness, other).

Results

Were the passengers aware that they were riding on a hydrogen-powered bus?

The hydrogen-powered bus deviated already from the typical look of a Munich city bus in its colours. Furthermore, on the inside of the bus there was highly visible information posters which explained that this bus was powered by hydrogen. This explains that the majority of the persons (128 of 145) was aware of the special nature of the bus.

Question 1 of the study: Acceptance of the hydrogen-powered bus

A high level of acceptance for the hydrogen-powered bus could also be found among passengers of the bus: The average value on the scale for acceptance was 4.28 (SD .53) (theoretical minimum: 1; theoretical maximum: 5).

There was almost unanimous agreement that the hydrogen-powered bus should be implemented more in the future (figure 9). The use of the first hydrogen bus in Munich was also overwhelmingly greeted. However, as already seen in the questionnaires of the students, the "dangerousness" of hydrogen technologies was assessed most critically. Nevertheless, this is to be looked at relative to the other answers; on average those polled agreed only "partly" to the statement "Hydrogen is connected with a danger of explosion". Altogether, based on these data, a positive assessment of hydrogen-powered transportation can be assumed.

Figure 9 Mean values of the evaluation of acceptance by the passengers. A large value always represents a high level of acceptance – the inverted items are marked.

In addition to the passengers the five drivers who were driving during the investigation were interviewed. It should be noted here that the drivers volunteered, and thus to be expected that they would have a positive attitude toward the bus. Indeed they answered the questions on general acceptance of hydrogen-powered transportation similarly positive as the passengers. Additionally, they were asked how they felt driving a hydrogen bus; the frequencies of the answers to these questions are represented in table 8.

Table 8
Assessment of the hydrogen bus by the busdrivers (N = 5). Frequency representation of the answers.

Only one of the drivers was afraid of having an accident; the same person was also worried about driving this bus. The other four drivers are in contrast quite calm about driving the bus and are also unafraid of having an accident. Nevertheless, only two persons like driving the bus as much as other busses. This is probably explained by the fact that the bus – particularly during the starting phase – was cause for a few surprises during the ride due to technical difficulties.

Question 2 of the study: Relationship between acceptance of hydrogen technologies and environmental awareness

There was a positive relationship between environmental attitudes and the acceptance of hydrogen technologies (r = .28, p < .01). This agrees with the student study, insofar that environmentally aware persons tend to assess hydrogen technologies positively. Of course, the relationship here is also not a strong one.

Question 3 of the study: Associations with hydrogen

Which associations do the passengers of the bus connect with "hydrogen"? In order to answer this question a measure of the relativefrequencies of the individual categories was determined, and from that mean values for the categories were calculated (see Study 1).

Figure 10 Frequencies in percent, with which the specific categories of associations were mentioned on average by the passengers

At first glance the large proportion of associations with environmental friendliness is striking (figure 10). On average over a third of the associations named in the bus were, for example, referred to the low emissions of hydrogen-powered transportation or to the general "environmental friendliness". Chemical knowledge directly related to hydrogen was only the second most frequent category. Nevertheless "chemical knowledge" is very loosely defined here: Most associations were, for example, "water" or "Knallgasreaktion" (oxyhydrogen gas reaction). Negative associations by the passengers played only a minor role: approximately 13% of the statements referred to the hydrogen bomb; other threatening associations (i.e. "danger of explosion") were mentioned only seldomly. "Hindenburg", "Zeppelin", and the like were hardly mentioned at all.

Question 4 of the investigation: Demand for information and sources of information about hydrogen

The passengers were asked next, whether they had already heard or read any information about hydrogen technologies. As could be expected this was not the case with the majority of the passengers (table 9).

Table 9
Information on the subject of hydrogen by the passengers (N = 145). Representation of the frequencies of the answers (% in parentheses).

Those persons who already possessed information were asked in a second step about the sources of that information (figure 11).

Figure 11 Sources of information for the passengers on the subject "Hydrogen technologies". Frequencies of answers in percent.

As with the students most of the answers named the mass media as a source of information. In 20% of the answers school was mentioned as a source of information. An astonishingly intensively used source of information was the bus operator, the Municipal Works of Munich – an indication for the fact that the information posters and leaflets are indeed noticed and read. A last less frequently named source was information from the job or course of studies.

Finally, all passengers were asked whether they had any interest in further information about hydrogen technologies (figure 12).

Figure 12 Answers to the item "I would like to have more information about hydrogen technologies". Frequency representation.

More than half of those questioned demonstrated a high level of agreement to this question; only very few are not interested in any more information. On average the item was agreed to with a value of 4.01 (SD: 1.35).

Discussion

In summary the results show a high level of acceptance of hydrogen-powered city busses on the part of the passengers: The values collected with the acceptance scale were very high on average. This result could be validated by the kind of associations which the passengers named on the subject "hydrogen". Hydrogen was only seldomly connected with threat or fear; on the contrary, positive, environmentaly friendly aspects were associated very frequently. These results confrmed the positive acceptance values which were found with the students.

The majority of those questioned knew at the start of the interview that they were in a hydrogen-powered bus. It can be concluded from this fact that "Fear of hydrogen-powered transportation" was no big deal for these residents of Munich. Sceptics could argue that only supporters of this technologie would even be in the bus, since others would not even be willing to get on the bus. To be sure, people waiting on the bus at the busstop were not interviewed, however, during the investigation the interviewers did not become aware of any situation where a person did not board or left the bust early.

It can be seen from the data – as with the students – that the level of information among the population is very low. However the persons questioned showed themselves to be interested in this subject. Apparently there is a deficit of practical – namely comprehensible, informative and accessible – sources of information.