Abstract
The present article deals with two key drivers of social acceptance of wind energy: procedural justice and distributional justice. It is based on a comparative expert assessment carried out in the frame of the Horizon 2020 project WinWind covering six European countries. The focus of the paper is on procedural and financial participation of citizens and local stakeholders in wind energy projects. The first part covers institutional arrangements for public engagement in two areas of the decision-making process—wind turbine zoning/siting in spatial plans and authorization procedures. Here, three levels of public involvement—information, consultation and participation—were analyzed. The second part examines active and financial participation of citizens and local stakeholders. Here, we distinguish between two different modes of governance: institutionalized forms of public governance and voluntary forms of corporate governance. The outcomes suggest that concrete paths to the social acceptance of wind energy are fostered via appropriate institutional spaces for public engagement. Furthermore, missing opportunities for active and passive financial participation can have strong negative consequences for community acceptance
Highlights
By 2050, the European Union (EU) aims at reaching climate-neutrality—an economy with net-zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
The number of the answers received is shown in Appendix B (Table A1)
In the countries under investigation, we found numerous examples of individual commercial developers that involve citizens as shareholders or lenders or that provide other community benefits via passive financial participation on a voluntary basis
Summary
By 2050, the European Union (EU) aims at reaching climate-neutrality—an economy with net-zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. This is the core of the European Green Deal according to the EU’s commitment to global climate action under the Paris Agreement [1]. Onshore wind would represent close to two thirds of total wind capacity in 2050 reaching 760 GW [2]. The wind onshore market is mature, with a competitive structure, providing a technology with high potential of GHG emission reduction [4]. In many countries, wind energy developments face increasing resistance at the local level and community acceptance of wind farms has become a critical bottleneck. In times, when the necessity of an energy transition towards renewable energy is becoming more and more urgent, the political attention towards social acceptance has been steadily increasing [5,6]
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