Adopt First - Transpose Later. The Effects of the EU Permitting Reform on the Alignment Between Renewable Energy Deployment and Nature Protection in Germany and the Netherlands

The search for the balance between steering member states towards common goals and acknowledging national peculiarities has been at the core of much of EU policy-making. Maintaining the balance between EU-wide goals, necessary policy harmonization and meaningful national variations has been particularly important when addressing long-term challenges, such as decarbonization, biodiversity restoration or industrial restructuring. However, the perpetual state of polycrisis facing the EU has injected additional complexity for aligning short-term crisis responses and long-term efforts towards structural transformations. In this study, we seek to empirically and theoretically advance the debate on crisis policy-making and integrated long-term steering by focusing on how the reform of the EU nature protection permitting rules for renewable energy projects have been transposed and with what effect at the national level. Empirically, we compare the implementation in Germany which has heavily shaped the new EU rules and the Netherlands which has been more on the receiving end. By drawing on the interviews and the analysis of relevant documents our study provides new evidence about the evolving nature and effects of the EU approach to align renewable energy deployment and nature protection offering both scholarly and policy lessons.