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Shaping Energy Landscapes: Public Participation and Conflict Resolution in Wind Power, Grid Expansion, and Biogas Transformation Fields

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Landscape Conflicts

Abstract

The manifestations of the energy transition, such as the expansion of power lines, wind or biogas plants, create ‘energy landscapes’. The changes often trigger public conflicts. Landscapes as the subject of public negotiation and communication processes play a central role, for example with regard to changes in land use through energy crops or the expansion of overland power lines, wind farms or solar parks. The article takes up conflicts in the three central transformation fields of the energy transition, which are grid expansion, wind power and biogas. Based on actual policy shifts and development in each field we work out similarities and differences in the causes of conflict on the basis of current research literature. Furthermore we analyse possible courses of action for conflict management through dialogue-oriented information and participation processes. The comparison of the fields illustrates the important role of public participation in conflict management, whereby differences in the scope, structure and uniformity of the transformation fields become apparent. The need for a professional and context-sensitive design of information and participation processes for joint solutions of all actors involved becomes clear.

This article is an extended, fundamentally revised and translated version of Jan-Hendrik Kamlage, Jan Warode, Julia Reinermann, Nicole de Vries and Esther Trost, “Von Konflikt und Dialog: Manifestationen der Energiewende in den Transformationsfeldern Netzausbau, Biogas und Windkraft”, In: R. Duttmann, O. Kühne, F. Weber, Landschaft als Prozess (Wiesbaden, Springer Fachmedien, 2020), pp. 603–633.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Acceptance can be traced back to a broad spectrum of reasons; from fear of coercion and sanctions, to approval and acceptance, to a conviction of the matter within the framework of a worldview (Schweiger et al. 2018, p. 432). It is an “unstable construct” (Schäfer and Keppler 2013, p. 25) and the result (…) “of a complex, permanent process of communication and action between acceptance subjects and acceptance objects extending over the entire life cycle of an acceptance object” (Bentele et al. 2015a, b, p. 5).

  2. 2.

    The expansion of the transmission grid proceeds in five steps: At the federal level, the need for power lines is determined by the scenario framework and network development plan. Every four years, the government adopts the Federal Requirements Plan, which sets out the requirements. The plan determines the scope of the expansion. The lower levels concretise and implement the plans. After the federal requirements plan, the routes are worked out. In the case of transnational or cross-border projects under the Federal Requirements Planning Act, the BNetzA is the competent approval authority. In the federal sectoral planning, a 1000 m wide corridor is initially defined before the exact route, mast locations and access routes for construction vehicles are determined in the subsequent planning approval procedures (cf. in detail Weber and Kühne 2021).

  3. 3.

    §Section 5a of the NABEG makes it possible to waive federal sectoral planning in the case of replacement or parallel new builds if these run predominantly in the corridor of the existing route. Since 2022, according to Section 18, Paragraph 3b of the NABEG, there has even been a bundling obligation for projects for which federal sectoral planning has been waived and an existing route is available.

  4. 4.

    At the national level, the federal government provides the framework with the overarching Spatial Planning Act, which is enforced by spatial plans at the state levels (state development programmes) and finally by regional planning The federal government has implemented the EU regulation on the accelerated expansion of renewable energies and grids in an amendment, and as a result the environmental impact assessment and a species protection law assessment can be dispensed with. In addition, municipalities can be involved through urban land use planning. In principle, wind turbines are considered “privileged projects in external areas” according to the Building Code and may therefore be built anywhere where they do not interfere with public interests. The project developers and/or operators are therefore responsible for the expansion, who look for suitable areas and submit applications to the municipal building authority. A planning tool at regional level (regional plans) is the designation of priority, reserve and suitability areas by planning authorities, which determine suitable areas or areas to be excluded for wind turbines.

  5. 5.

    Roßmeier and Weber also show that the extent of protests does not necessarily correspond to the number of wind turbines on site and that “especially in Hessen and Baden-Württemberg […] there is a high level of resistance with a relatively low number of wind turbines” (Roßmeier and Weber 2018, pp. 60–61).

  6. 6.

    Hoeft et al. (2017) explain the various empirical studies on the acceptance of renewable energies by society as a whole and the variance in the results. Basically, it can be stated that between 70 and 80% of respondents are in favour of the expansion of renewable energies (ibid.). Teune (2022, p. 179) provides insights into the perspectives of the different groups behind the aggregated approval or rejection values and shows that socio-demographic factors and trust in institutions play an important role. Rejection can also be understood as a “performative gesture of resistance”. Figures from 2022 show, against the backdrop of Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine and the energy crisis, that the acceptance of renewable energies has risen to 86% (Renewable Energy Agency 2022).

  7. 7.

    Bell et al. (2013) show that the social-gap is mainly determined by “limited supporters”, i.e. people who make a reasoned rejection and a few landscape conservationists, and less by strict opponents and possibly self-interested NIMBYs.

  8. 8.

    It is also a key factor in the bioeconomy (BMBF and BMEL 2020) in order to develop more sustainable forms of economy.

  9. 9.

    Overall, renewable raw materials accounted for 48% of substrate use in 2020. Taking into account the energy content of the various substrates, however, this share shifts significantly to 76%, while the second largest substrate group, “slurry”, falls from 48% by mass to 17% by energy (Dotzauer et al. 2022, p. 21). In terms of energy, maize accounted for 41.4% of the renewable raw materials (Reference year: 2018, Rensberg et al. 2019, p. 4).

  10. 10.

    The moral concerns have an international context, as Germany, along with many other EU-25 countries, imports biomass, which is mostly related to livestock feed. This can be seen as an export of the risks of intensive agriculture. To address the concerns and reduce the risks, sustainable production of biomass and a secure supply of food and other goods for the local population would have to be ensured, as well as the avoidance of environmental conflicts (Anton and Steinicke 2012, p. 7).

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Correspondence to Jan-Hendrik Kamlage .

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Kamlage, JH., Uhlig, J., Rogall, M., Warode, J. (2024). Shaping Energy Landscapes: Public Participation and Conflict Resolution in Wind Power, Grid Expansion, and Biogas Transformation Fields. In: Berr, K., Koegst, L., Kühne, O. (eds) Landscape Conflicts. RaumFragen: Stadt – Region – Landschaft. Springer VS, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-43352-9_16

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-43352-9_16

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