Wind power planning in France (Aveyron), from state regulation to local planning

Abstract

The development of wind energy in France presents an exemplary case of contrast between the policy instrument and its effectiveness in terms of installed wind power capacity. After 7 years of one of the highest feed-in tariffs in the world, the installed capacity in France is still very low. This is notably due to a diffuse pattern of administrative landscape protection which impacts on the construction of wind power potential. In turn, the pace of wind power development can be understood only by looking in more detail at the way in which landscape is dealt with in local planning processes. This paper examines the question using the case of Aveyron in southern France. We follow the shifting ways in which landscape is enrolled in wind power planning, in a context where new planning instruments favor an incipient decentralization in wind power policy. The case points to a change in both the networks and the concepts involved in the design of landscape representations that underlie the construction of wind power potential. We show that this change has been forced by the far-reaching and decentralized visual impacts of wind power technology, suggesting that technology is recomposing the social as part of its development process and questioning the very meaning and perception that is given to landscape.

Introduction

By the end of 2006, wind energy totaled up to 48 GW of installed capacity in the European Union (Observ’er, 2007a). About 10 years ago, researchers pointed to a changing agenda for renewable energies (Walker, 1995), including considerations concerning issues of planning the development of renewable energy (Hull, 1995) and wind energy (McKenzie Hedger, 1995). Since the installed wind power capacity mirrored the type of financial instruments underlying wind power policies, the debate about these policies remained focused on the instruments (e.g., Haas et al., 2004 for a synopsis of this debate). This has recently changed and the policy debate has become wider. A broader set of conditions underlying wind power development is now being considered again, including the planning regime, the local/cultural context (McLaren Loring, 2007, Toke, 2005; Toke et al., 2008), turbine ownership (Devine Wright, 2005, McFadyen and Warren, 2007), and the propensity of policy schemes to foster a societal engagement in policy design and implementation (Breukers and Wolsink, 2007, Cowell and Strachan, 2007, Szarka, 2006).

France is an exemplary case of contrast between policy instrument and installed capacity. After 7 years of one of the highest feed-in tariffs in Europe (Ministry of Economy, 2000, Ministry of Economy, 2001, Ministry of Economy, 2006a), the installed capacity is still very low (1.8 GW) compared with other countries which have relied on the same type of tariffs: Spain (11.6 GW), Germany (20.6 GW) and Denmark (3.14 GW) (figures from the end of 2006, Observ’er, 2007a). Institutional lock-in into nuclear energy is one reason that explains the French case (Szarka, 2007). Another reason is a diffuse pattern of administrative landscape protection which impacts on the construction of wind farms. Landscape is among the principal reasons invoked by the local administration for rejecting projects. On average, about 20% of wind power applications were denied construction permits in 2005 (Minefi, 2006), a proportion which varied from 0% to 56% depending on the region. Local opposition was not systematically involved in these results, since wind power has been opposed on a strong and regular basis by civil society only in some tourist and secondary residence areas or in places where landscape is particularly valued (e.g., Provence Alpes Côtes d’Azur, Basse Normandie, Rhône Alpes). Elsewhere, the pace taken by wind power development can only be understood by looking in more detail at the way in which landscape was enrolled by the administration in planning processes.

Representations of nature and of the environment have held scholars’ attention in relation to wind power. Analysts have shown how landscape is endowed with a moral dimension in relation to energy consumption patterns (Pasqualetti, 2000) and how nature/rural space is at the core of discourse coalitions in wind power conflicts (Woods, 2003, Szarka, 2004, Warren et al., 2005). Landscape culture – meaning the ways in which landscape is traditionally accounted for by lay persons, landscape protection organizations and local/national administration in different societies – has been pointed to as one factor underlying wind power development (Coles and Taylor, 1993, Danielsen, 1995, Toke et al., 2008), but detailed attention has also recently been given to landscape representations in relation to the planning processes (Burall, 2004, Cowell, 2007, Wolsink, forthcoming).

Because of their visual impact, industrial turbines are rarely compatible with the current representations and categories of European landscapes (Selman, 2007). While wind power developments have good chances of meeting with more acceptance in parts of the territory characterized by extended industrial landscapes or the absence of heritage landscapes, these developments are always potentially controversial. Three routes are then open to policy makers and planners. The first one consists of accepting a limited development (route 1). The second is to have recourse to the administrative hierarchy and try to impose quantitative targets on local and regional authorities. As Richard Cowell illustrates using a Welsh study (Cowell, 2007), such meta-governance tends to reinforce existing landscape patterns by targeting developments on less valued landscape area, ultimately raising issues of environmental justice (route 2). The third route consists in approaching wind power issues as an occasion to reconsider the rules governing landscape valuation (route 3). This means establishing processes and procedures which would allow for the “creation of wind power landscapes”, as advocated by the French Agency for Energy. In trying to do so, the difficulty is that we do not know what type of landscape wind power could compose, so that it is up to policy and planning processes to set the conditions for the emergence of corresponding landscape representations. In other words, if wind energy is to make a significant contribution as an alternative to current energy patterns, we should not try to fit turbines into existing landscapes but rather to set up processes by which new landscape representations might arise along with wind power developments and make the new landscapes sustainable. The key question is then how to define such processes.

French institutions have followed several routes in developing wind power. Despite repeated announcements of significant targets (Ministry of Economy, 2006b), the national level seemed implicitly to accommodate itself to the slow pace of wind power development (route 1).¹ By contrast, the local level was often faced with a “wind dash” and did its best to regulate developments. This was done through a mixture of hierarchy imposing conformity with existing landscape protection regulations (route 2) and ad hoc, more open processes looking for ways of defining new compatibilities between landscapes and wind power (route 3). Only recently (that is, 7 years after the adoption of the French fixed tariffs) did the national level implement a planning framework (Ministry of Energy, 2005) with great but uncertain potential: wind power development zones. As things are, French WPDZ might foster bottom-up planning and what could be called a French variant of “decentralization”,² but they also might well boil down to hierarchical decision-making under the authority of the local state (i.e., department prefects)³ (Nadaï, 2007a). Success in this decentralization depends on whether or not the relation between local state representatives and other local actors can be re-organized so as to make room for genuine cross-fertilization in the design of these zones. Only on this condition can WPDZ depart from mere hierarchical planning and landscapes be processed in a way that allows for the emergence of new landscape representations.

This paper examines the question using the case of Aveyron in southern France. We follow the shifting ways in which landscape is enrolled in wind power planning in a context where WPDZ favor an incipient decentralization in wind power policy. The case points to a change in both the concepts and networks that lead to the landscape representations underlying the construction of wind power potential. We show that this change is forced by the far-reaching and decentralized visual impacts of wind power technology, suggesting that technology is recomposing the social as part of its development process and questioning the very meaning and perception that is given to landscape.

The first part of the paper presents the materials and method. The second part provides background information about Aveyron wind power before proceeding to analyze Aveyron wind power planning. The third part discusses the results by placing them in perspective with other French regions and the international wind power planning literature.