Abstract
Abstract. The number of actors in the German Energy Transition as well as the planning complexity increases and new spatial implications emerge in contrast to the conventional energy system. In planning processes for Renewable Energy Technologies mostly economic approaches are chosen, but simultaneously the number of social conflicts related to wind power plants or solar energy plants is on an all-time high. The aim of the study is therefore to identify the essential parameters of a sustainable expansion of renewable energies from the diversity of potential influencing factors and to illustrate them using a regional case study and GIS. The analyses reveal the great regional assertiveness of photovoltaics, whereby wind energy can assert itself due to social parameters also at some locations. Beyond this, it is to be stated that renewable energies find themselves in intense economic and social competition for space, although the most compatible spatial solutions have not always been able to prevail so far. Nevertheless, the presented approach offers a sophisticated method to minimize the social conflicts that arise in the context of the energy system transformation.
Highlights
Since the beginning of the German Energy Transition debates about the system transformation focussed strongly on engineering perspectives (Blaschke et al, 2013)
Many local conflicts arose along planning processes, leading to a breach of trust between project planners and the local population
Zoellner et al (2008) even claim that the technological characteristics of Renewable Energy Technologies (RET) can be neglected and the focus for planning processes should exclusively lay on negotiation processes between different actors
Summary
Since the beginning of the German Energy Transition debates about the system transformation focussed strongly on engineering perspectives (Blaschke et al, 2013). Zoellner et al (2008) even claim that the technological characteristics of RET can be neglected and the focus for planning processes should exclusively lay on negotiation processes between different actors This approach is rather challenging as many new actors are involved in the energy system transformation. Power supply companies but communities, middle-class companies, associations and private persons can take part in planning and operating local renewable energy plants (Gailing et al, 2013) The motives underlying these actors actions are as diverse as they are contradictory and lead to a much greater socio-technical complexity in the development of renewable energy systems than was the case in the context of pure fossil-nuclear energy systems, where the major energy suppliers have made economic and rational decisions on the expansion of power plants as far as possible in accordance with the manageable entrepreneurial and social objectives of economic efficiency and security of supply (Bosch, 2018)
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