Social Acceptance of Wind Power Projects: Learning from Trans-National Experience

Abstract

Travelling through the countryside in Denmark, North Germany, Spain or even certain parts of North America, one cannot help but notice the thousands of wind turbines dominating the landscape. Yet in other countries, such as the UK, Ireland or Switzerland, wind projects are still relatively isolated features. This reflects the fact that different countries have very different wind resources and have adopted a variety of institutional, policy and direct support regimes for their exploitation (Toke et al. 2008). Wind power projects have also been confronted with very different responses from local communities in each region of the world. This means that there are major opportunities for learning from different countries’ experiences and for exchanging good practice in many aspects of wind deployment. This is particularly true for the factors that may influence social acceptance of wind energy, whose increasing significance has stimulated varied and sometimes innovative responses. For this reason, the International Energy Agency (IEA) has established an interdisciplinary working group of its Wind Implementing Agreement for Co-operation in the Research, Development and Deployment of Wind Energy Systems (IEA Wind) to address social acceptance under ‘Task 28’. This has established an international network of experts to consolidate and review the research and practical experience on the social acceptance of wind power (Huber and Hobarty 2010).