Local Environmental Concerns vs Climate: Increasing Societal Polarisation in Energy Policy

Abstract

The transition towards a low-carbon society is dependent on further electrification of transport, buildings and industry based on renewable energy. Energy projects such as renewable energy deployment or grid construction are being built to phase out fossil fuels to cut CO2 emissions. However, such constructions require large interventions in nature, resulting in two key challenges that tend to oppose each other: climate change mitigation versus local environmental concerns. This challenge in combatting climate change while not having a negative impact on biodiversity is particularly well-known related to deployment of wind power, where environmental organizations tend to struggle to reconcile, and sometimes leads to split local communities. The conflict is highlighted by the fact that around 70% of EU species and critical ecosystem services are threatened by habitat loss and degradation as a result of urban sprawl, agricultural and forestry intensification and land abandonment. Energy projects comes in addition to such tendencies. The EU’s 7th Environment Action Programme states that there is a need for a coherent, joined-up approach to ensure the integration of environment issues into other policies. In the panel we will present results from the Horizon2020 project WinWind, which studies socially inclusive and environmentally sound market uptake of wind energy, particularly in wind energy scarce regions. We invite papers that focus on increasing societal polarization in energy and climate policy, in particular the conflict between opposing concerns, including contributions addressing social acceptance and compromise solutions. We are also interested in papers that explore how policy integration between climate mitigation and biodiversity protection are being dealt with and suggest improvements.