Wind In My Backyard: Using holistic modelling tools to advance social awareness and engagement on large wind power installations in the EU

Project Information

WIMBY

Grant agreement ID: 101083460

DOI

10.3030/101083460

Project closed

EC signature date 26 September 2022

Start date 1 January 2023

End date 31 December 2025

Funded under

• Climate, Energy and Mobility

Total cost

€ 3 346 455,00

EU contribution

€ 3 346 455,00

Coordinated by

VRIJE UNIVERSITEIT BRUSSEL
Belgium

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - WIMBY (Wind In My Backyard: Using holistic modelling tools to advance social awareness and engagement on large wind power installations in the EU)

Reporting period: 2023-01-01 to 2024-06-30

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Wind power is one of the fastest-growing, most mature and cost-competitive renewable energy technologies. But its deployment faces significant challenges due to a lack of understanding of the (distribution of) complex (positive and negative) impacts and their interplay with low local acceptance.
WIMBY wants to address these challenges by fostering the societal engagement of citizens and stakeholders so that wind energy can gain substantially more popular support, thereby enabling its important role in Europe's decarbonisation goals.
To do so, the results of in-depth models for assessing the potential for the development of wind parks are translated into useful and comprehensive information and tools for stakeholders, facilitating decision making towards lower impact and more participative wind energy deployment. To thoroughly assess location-dependent potential impacts, conflicts and synergies of wind power deployment on the natural and social environment, WIMBY combines high resolution spatially explicit techno-economic models under multiple regulatory frameworks, with models to assess environmental, security and health impacts on the one hand, and models to determine potential synergies in ecosystems on the other.
WIMBY follows a citizens' science approach for dissemination supported by a newly developed Web-GIS interactive forum that improves the content and functionality of the New European Wind Atlas. On a community level, four geographically, climatically and socio-economically diverse pilot cases across the EU are studied. Here detailed modelling and an immersive 3D platform and a Multi-Criteria Satisfaction Analysis framework are employed in workshops with stakeholders of potential projects.
Throughout the project, WIMBY aims at deepening the knowledge on the drivers and barriers for social acceptance and developing guidelines to raise public understanding and engagement with wind power, especially promoting the uptake of new generations of large(r) wind power turbines and farms.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

To estimate wind resources availability and quality, evaluate their consequences on land use and sea use, and assess the biodiversity risk, three main elements were developed:
1/ A wind power API, which considers the wind resources, wind farm boundaries, and user-supplied turbine specifications for any European region and provides the wind turbines’ locations to maximize the wind farm’s energy production
2/ A model and data reflecting land and sea use change. This covers the impact of 13,000 turbine locations across the continent, including a plugin for the assessment of individual new potential sites
3/ An assessment and data of a European-wide collision-mortality risk for birds and bats species
Additionally, the first version of an impact assessment on terrestrial and marine fauna at the WIMBY pilot regions was finalized, as well as a first LCA study, that provides an insight into existing and expected end-of-life treatments of wind turbines, foundation technologies for offshore installations, and correlations between material masses and rated power.


With regard to the assessment of the impact of onshore and offshore wind power on society in Europe, the following output was developed:
1/ A first version of novel open-source tools designed to assess the noise, shadow flicker, and safety impacts of wind turbines on the population in Europe
2/ A first version of a dataset on different landscape impact metrics which assists in estimating the landscape quality via the indicators naturalness, human impact, remoteness, and ruggedness
3/ A mapping of regulations, governance models, financing resources, and the potential for job creation in the wind power industry in Europe.

All these developed models and output provide high-resolution information for the spatial deployment of wind power projects and possible mitigation measures throughout Europe.
They have been integrated into the first version of the WIMBY Interactive Map, which is currently operational. A design approach with co-creation workshops was adopted to maximize consortium partners' and external stakeholders' engagement (through interviews, feedback sessions, and tests), and to make sure their needs could be integrated in the technical requirements of the map.

Additionally, an immersive 3D platform was developed to engage stakeholders and the local population in identifying trade-offs and social acceptance patterns for wind energy development. This platform utilizes a serious games approach, comprehensive interactive 3D visualizations, and VR glasses, and was positively evaluated during a first series of workshops in the WIMBY pilot region of Pantelleria.
During the upcoming workshops in the WIMBY pilot regions this 3D platform will be supplemented with an already developed MUSA survey, BASEline questionnaire, and debriefing questionnaire.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The project provides a variety of tools and methods to overcome the ever-more pressing societal opposition against wind energy infrastructure in potentially sensitive communities, landscapes, and ecosystems. In particular the WIMBY Interactive Map, the WIMBY wind power tool, the immersive 3D platform, and the Multi-Criteria Satisfaction Analysis (MCSA) are tools that go beyond the state of the art. In the developed process which combines these three, the multidimensionality and complexity of the energy supply problem is communicated to stakeholders in an insightful way, and through workshops they are guided to determine acceptable trade-offs and satisfaction levels.
Demonstration and deployment of the developed methodology in selected pilot regions, in the second half of the project, will provide essential feedback to further improve the methods and tools, and derive policy recommendations.
At the end of the project, WIMBY results will offer an integrated and significant contribution to efforts geared at further expanding RE capacities in Europe, applicable beyond the specific technological and regional focus chosen in the project.