Forests take on new role as energy crisis deepens

By Sara Seddon Kilbinger, Senior Reporter, REFIRE

Solar and wind farms to be expanded to tackle energy crisis

German forests, particularly those which have suffered from drought, are being given a new lease of life with the expansion of wind and solar farms, due to the Wind on Land Act, which comes into force in February next year, in a bid to help Germany tackle its deepening energy crisis.

According to government plans, 2% of Germany’s land area is to be reserved for wind turbines alone by 2032. So far, however, this figure is just 0.8% as the expansion of wind projects has stalled. Under the terms of the act, the protection of forest species will be weakened to push projects through more quickly, something that has understandably been criticized by environmentalists. The law will also enable distance rules between residential areas and wind turbines to be overruled in some cases. However, in federal states with strict distance rules, such as Bavaria, new wind turbines will typically only be located in remote forest areas, including forests owned by the Thurn und Taxis family. One third or 11.4 million hectares of the national area of Germany is forested, according to the Ministry of Food and Agriculture and around half of German forests are privately owned.

The new act is a natural response to the country’s deepening energy crisis. Last month,

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz ordered the country's three remaining nuclear power stations to keep operating until mid-April, as the energy crisis sparked by Russia's invasion of Ukraine continues to ravage the economy. Originally, Germany had intended to phase out all three stations by the end of 2022. Nuclear power provides 6% of Germany's electricity but gas prices have rocketed since Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which has disrupted Russia's huge oil and gas exports to the EU. In August, Russia turned off the gas flowing to Germany via the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, leaving Germany scrambling to maintain sufficient reserves for the winter.

Bavaria leads solar charge

Solar expansion targets in Germany are equally ambitious as the ones for wind. This year, capacity is to rise to seven gigawatts; by 2026, it is due to hit 22 gigawatts. Solar farms require more land than wind farms because they can only go wider, not taller, to increase output, which means more solar power also means more lucrative deals for landowners. Bavaria is leading the charge, with more private plots of land fitted with solar panels than anywhere else in the country. In the first eight months of 2022, there were about 1300 megawatts of additional capacity, which equates to 29% of the capacity installed in Germany during that period, with 19% of the area covered by solar panels: ‘Bavaria is sunshine country, and we are living up to that name,’ said Energy Minister Hubert Aiwanger.

However, landowners have a number of hurdles to overcome. Authorities don’t grant permission for all projects, neighbours can complain and, in other instances, the development costs are just too high. Wind power projects are regulated by the Federal Immission Control Act, which controls noise requirements and species protection, such as for birds and bats. In addition, there are regulations to protect air traffic and military facilities, such as radar installations. Construction planning and the designation of suitable areas by local authorities is also a protracted process: ‘It is not unusual for eight years to pass from the initial planning to the construction of wind turbines,’ said Marie-Luise Pörtner, managing director of renewal energy group BayWa r.e. Wind.

Ambitious wind turbine project under way in the Reinhardswald

The German state of Hesse has one of Europe’s largest undisturbed forest areas, the Reinhardswald, also known as the ‘Grimm’s fairytale forest’. Approval has already been granted for the construction of wind turbines on around seven so-called ‘priority areas’ totaling around 20 million square metres. Plans are already underway on other areas in the Reinhardswald with 10 turbines due to be built on the KS26 location, and nine more on theKS14.

Renewable energy accounted for 49% of German power consumption in the first half of 2022, up 6% percentage points from a year earlier thanks to favourable weather conditions. Higher sunshine intensity and wind speeds were behind the trend, according to the utility industry association BDEW and the Centre for Solar Energy and Hydrogen Research (ZSW).

2030 deadline to end deforestation unlikely to be met

However, mass deforestation to make way for more wind and solar parks is not the solution: most governments and organisations globally remain committed to halving deforestation by 2020 and ending it by 2030, under the New York declaration on forests. The first target was missed and the second will be a challenge. Forests serve as carbon ‘sinks’, absorbing a net 7.6 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide each year. Slashing, burning or thinning trees or otherwise degrading ecosystems accounts for 11% of emissions. Subsequently, programmes to plant and protect forests will be vital to meeting the Paris agreement’s targets of limiting the rise in global average temperatures to between 1.5°C and well below 2° above pre-industrial levels.

The text of the Paris agreement lays out a balance between anthropogenic emissions and sinks ‘in the second half of this century’, which has led to a flurry of national and corporate strategies for hitting net-zero emissions through forestry, from restoring carbon-rich peatlands to developing agroforestry.