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Wind turbines near Ebersbach (Bavaria)
Photo: Karl-Josef Hildenbrand/ dpa
The vast majority of federal states are currently lagging miles behind the federal government's targets for wind power expansion.
Bavaria in particular is in a bad position because of its controversial 10H rule, which defines the minimum distance between a wind turbine and the nearest residential area.
This must therefore correspond to ten times the height of the wheel.
For a 200 meter high wind turbine, this is 2000 meters.
Since the introduction of the controversial regulation, the expansion of wind power in Bavaria has practically come to a standstill.
After a long discussion, the CSU parliamentary group recently voted to relax the previous strict rule.
In certain areas, the minimum distance between wind turbines and residential buildings is now to be reduced to 1,000 meters.
But that doesn't go far enough for the Bavarian economy.
"Every newly built or upgraded wind turbine is good for Bavaria and that's why we need as many of them as possible," said the President of the Bavarian Business Association (vbw), Wolfram Hatz, after a meeting with the CSU Presidium in Munich.
Therefore, there is a need for an even stronger departure from the 10H rule.
Söder warns of strife in the villages
Bavaria's Prime Minister Markus Söder, on the other hand, defended the moderate easing, for example in the vicinity of commercial and industrial areas.
Two percent of the country's area should also be designated as priority areas for wind turbines.
But he asks for your understanding that the interests of the economy cannot only be taken into account unilaterally, said the CSU politician.
The legislature must also think of the citizens, "otherwise there is a risk of strife in the villages" and the resulting chaos will not help the energy transition any further.
In this context, Söder also attacked political demands that wind turbines would be subject to approval if emission protection requirements were met.
This "green model" is without any controls and only provokes controversy.
The new "10H-Light" rule enables at least 800 new wind turbines in Bavaria, Söder continues.
In any case, his prognosis is that Bavaria will become real competition for northern Germany when it comes to onshore wind turbines.
He cited the higher efficiency of the new wind turbines as the reason for this.
The federal government has been fighting for a long time to significantly accelerate the expansion of wind turbines.
A draft bill to amend the building code provides for the repeal of a regulation that previously allowed the federal states to set minimum distances between wind turbines and residential buildings.
State regulations that have already been made should remain in place.
hej/dpa-AFX