As of: February 25, 2024, 12:12 p.m
By: Felix Herz
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By 2027, there will be wind turbines on 1.1 percent of the area of the Free State in Bavaria.
Many people also support this.
But no one wants one near them.
Munich – wind power, yes – but please not on my doorstep.
That seems to be the motto of many people in Bavaria.
When it comes to designating new areas for wind turbines, there is often resistance from the population.
This recently happened impressively in Altötting, where a referendum rejected the Altötting wind farm.
Citizens' concerns are understandable.
They are afraid of noise pollution, reduction in property values and drying out of the forest floor.
So get away from inhabited areas and into nature?
The animal rights activists have something against that.
Then to agricultural land?
Not easy either.
Where to put the wind turbines?
There is no alternative to expansion – but there are high hurdles
The onshore wind law came into force at the beginning of 2023.
This involves “designating a percentage of the state’s area for onshore wind energy” – for Bavaria, “in a first step, 1.1 percent of the region’s area was set for each region by December 31, 2027”.
This is what the Bavarian State Ministry for Housing, Construction and Transport writes.
By 2027, 1.1 percent of the area in Bavaria should be designated for wind energy.
Business, politics, citizens – most also recognize this necessity.
But when it comes to the question of the exact locations, there is resistance.
© SuperStock / IMAGO
Now we are looking for areas on which new wind turbines can – and should – be built.
But there is resistance and hurdles from several sides.
Example citizens' page: As
wochenblatt-dlv.de
shows, residents fear loss of property value, nuisance from infrasound and drying out of forest soils.
They demand that the wind turbines be built away from residential areas - i.e. in nature.
The State Association for Bird and Nature Conservation in Bavaria e.
V., represented by Andreas von Lindeiner at BR, warns that the wind turbines must be built where they do not endanger species protection.
Bats and birds can be killed by wind turbines.
He is passing the ball to agriculture, where, according to him, fewer species live.
According to BR, Michael Diestel from the Bavarian Farmers' Association has nothing against this.
He points to the high efficiency of wind turbines in terms of their land consumption - and sees the expansion of renewable energies as a great opportunity for agriculture.
Areas would become dry due to rapidly advancing climate change, so these areas are actually suitable for wind turbines.
According to him, things are looking bad for agricultural land that is used for livestock and biogas plants.
This varies from region to region.
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Bureaucracy and other obstacles – Wind turbines are also not allowed to be too close to the motorways
Of course there are other obstacles.
Munich, for example: There are numerous sensitive measuring stations around the state capital, to which a large distance must be maintained, as well as civil and military airfields, the radius of which must also be taken into account.
Then there is the idea of setting up wind turbines along highways - easier said than done.
The noise emissions from wind turbines are added to the noise from the motorways, which means that limit values are exceeded.
They also have to maintain a distance of 150 meters from the expressways - as ice could potentially fall from the rotor blades in winter, writes the BR.
So where are the solutions?
On the one hand, politicians try to address and clarify the concerns and fears of citizens through dialogue.
Most recently, according to
wochenblatt-dlv.de
, Economics Minister Hubert Aiwanger and the Green Party leader Eva Lettenbauer appeared together on the BR program “Now red i” to refute the citizens' concerns.
Citizen dialogue and more positive perspectives – the path to more wind turbines?
At BR, a landscape professor from the Technical University of Munich is also promoting discussions with the population and developing ideas and strategies in joint workshops about where wind turbines could be located.
This has already proven to be successful in the past.
In addition, the wind turbines must be compared with their alternatives - wind turbines would not destroy the landscape nearly as much as what happens day after day in the brown coal opencast mining areas.
Finally, the professor at BR calls for a change in the view of wind turbines - the consideration must be how one can live well with them and not where one has to suffer them.
(fhz)
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