In the eye of the energy transition storm
By REINER BURGER (text)
and STEFAN LUCKA (photos)
October 6, 2022 The Berlin traffic light government and the black-green coalition in North Rhine-Westphalia want to push the expansion of wind power "massively".
Climate protection should come before species protection.
Not everyone likes that, as can be seen in Sauerland, for example.
The path to the forest of Graf Plettenberg in the Sauerland region of Marsberg-Essentho leads past the edge of the Paderborner Land.
The region is regarded as the German heart of inland wind power.
Hundreds of generators are already turning there alone.
So this is what the forced energy transition that the Berlin traffic light government has planned looks like.
In the Sauerland, which begins just a few kilometers to the south and is hardly less windy, there are only a few rotors.
Together with two comrades-in-arms, Maximilian von Papen and Count von Spee, Count von Plettenberg wants to change that as quickly as possible.
The families of the three have been cultivating extensive commercial forests around Brilon and Marsberg for generations.
But where spruces once stood close together, apocalyptic areas called calamity areas are now opening up.
Large parts of the forest no longer exist.
First, the drought weakened him in four of the last five summers.
Then the bark beetle snatched away the damaged trees.
Typical traces: This is what the bark of the trees looks like after a bark beetle infestation.
It has already killed many trees.
In Essentho, Friedrich-August Graf von Plettenberg – a tall man in a lumberjack shirt – asks if he would prefer to switch to his pick-up off-road vehicle.
"The forest path has suffered quite a bit from the large timber removal." Forest path is actually no longer a correct term.
Because the gravel road does not lead through dense forest as it did a few years ago, but over open fields.
After a good kilometer, district forester Klaus Kotthoff parks the car.
"Here we have a wonderful view of the Dütlingstal," he says sarcastically.
Kotthoff points to a bare patch.
"There used to be a 40 to 120-year-old spruce forest down there, and what's on the right will sooner or later be knocked over by the wind."
"There used to be a 40 to 120-year-old spruce forest down there, and what's on the right will sooner or later be knocked over by the wind."
FRIEDRICH-AUGUST COUNT OF PLETTENBERG
The new forest dieback driven by climate change is dramatic.
In their distress, many family forest operations rely on wind power as a source of income - to be able to pay their employees and to be able to finance the decades of reforestation with more resilient tree species.
Count von Plettenberg would like to put six or seven wind turbines in his forest.
Likewise, a few kilometers away, Count von Spee and Maximilian von Papen want to do the same.
The forest stands black and silent: the dead trees won't last much longer.
The forest stands black and silent: the dead trees won't last much longer.
Friedrich-August Graf von Plettenberg, parts of his forest in the background
Friedrich-August Graf von Plettenberg, parts of his forest in the background
Maximilian von Papen in a former forest area
Maximilian von Papen in a former forest area
The three wind power projects in Sauerland fit in perfectly with the policy of the Berlin traffic light government.
SPD, Greens and FDP want to ensure that the share of renewable energies is “drastically” increased to 80 percent by 2030.
Planning and approval procedures are to be significantly accelerated "and all hurdles and obstacles removed", as the traffic light coalition agreement puts it somewhat martially.
In times of climate change and gas shortages, the new energy policy state doctrine is: Renewable energies serve to ensure security of supply and are therefore in the public interest.
In order to defuse the conflict of objectives with species protection, which had become apparent to a broader public, primarily due to birds such as the red kite, the Federal Nature Conservation Act was changed literally at lightning speed.
The coalition agreement of the North Rhine-Westphalian state government formed by the CDU and the Greens at the end of June specifically states that “at least an additional 1000 wind turbines” are to be erected between the Rhine and Weser by 2027 – which has put black and green under enormous pressure.
To the delight of many forest farmers, the black-green alliance agreement also contains this sentence: "We will open all calamity areas and damaged forest areas for wind energy." Because there, new plants can usually be built far away from the nearest residents.
The NRW state association of the Federal Government for the Environment and Nature Conservation (BUND) has long since made its peace with wind power in the forest - and in March even wrote a joint position paper on the subject with the forest farmers' association for the first time.
So far in the open field: wind turbines near Brilon
There could hardly be better omens for the three wind power projects in Sauerland.
If there wasn't a small association called "Nature and Bird Protection in the Hochsauerland" (VNV).
Without the consent of the three owner families, amateur ornithologists were out and about in the forests to map a large number of birds, including the gray woodpecker and the great gray shrike - which, by all appearances, is only intended to be a means to a greater end.
According to the VNV, it is also about averting "the danger posed by the excessive expansion of wind power".
In December 2019, the association submitted a correspondingly extensive application for the designation of a "Diemeltal and Hoppecketal bird sanctuary".
If the VNV had its way, 28,000 hectares would have to be protected under the EU Birds Directive.
According to a decision by the EU Commission, the procedures have actually been completed since 2004.
However, the State Agency for Nature, Environment and Consumer Protection (LANUV), which is subordinate to the North Rhine-Westphalian Ministry of the Environment, nevertheless opened the procedure for an area reduced to around 12,400 hectares, which the North Rhine-Westphalian state association of the German Nature Conservation Union (NABU), which is critical of wind power, immediately praised enthusiastically.
The planned bird sanctuary in Hochsauerland
Until the final decision, the area is considered a "de facto bird sanctuary".
A classification that has far-reaching consequences for the forest owners – who, in addition to the three families, also own the towns of Brilon, Marsberg, Olsberg and Bad Wünnenberg.
Because no legal remedies can be raised in this interim phase, and there is also a comprehensive de facto ban on changes.
At the request of the SPD, the district council of the Hochsauerland district voted against the bird sanctuary with a large majority.
The forest owners turned to the then North Rhine-Westphalian Environment Minister Ursula Heinen-Esser (CDU) - who, however, saw herself as bound by EU law.
"Species protection is important, but it loses credibility if it is used for other purposes."
MAXIMILIAN OF PAPEN
Christof Bartsch, the social-democratic mayor of Brilon, accuses the VNV of having "secretly wanted to create facts as quickly as possible without taking the affected landowners with him".
Forest owner Maximilian von Papen goes even further.
He speaks of a prankster prank.
"Species protection is important, but it loses credibility if it is used for other purposes." The VNV is trying to register a large EU bird protection area with the help of hastily reported and highly questionable data.
This undermines the broad social and political consensus for the expansion of wind power, says von Papen, who has now arrived at a calamity area near Alme with his colleagues to talk about the gray woodpecker.
The surface,
owned by the von Spee family resembles a heathland.
A dense spruce forest once stood here too.
The forest workers have been busy transporting the wood away for weeks.
Only a small remnant is stacked to the left and right of the gravel path.
Where there used to be dense spruce forest, now there is only fallow land left.
Large quantities of wood have already been removed.
Positioning the Gray Woodpecker against wind turbines is a pretty daring undertaking in and of itself.
Because unlike the red kite, the bird is not one of the so-called wind power-sensitive species - because it simply does not fly that high.
In addition: The gray woodpecker needs old, extensive and structurally rich deciduous forests, it avoids coniferous stands such as the areas on which the three families want to build wind turbines.
A publicly appointed environmental expert confirms in a report commissioned by von Papen that the gray woodpecker is not threatened.
From the expert's point of view, the areas were therefore "wrongly" included in the bird sanctuary.
Maximilian von Papen thinks that the conflict in the Sauerland is a good opportunity for the new North Rhine-Westphalian Environment Minister Oliver Krischer (Greens) to show that species protection and climate protection can be combined.
"One must not be played off against the other," says the self-confessed CDU supporter, who has been intensively involved with renewable energies since the Fukushima reactor accident eleven years ago and has already operated a number of wind turbines.
Taking action against wind power projects with the help of the EU bird sanctuary instrument is a "method that must not be adopted, because otherwise Germany would not be able to achieve its expansion goals," warns von Papen.
Wind turbines are already part of the landscape in many places.
In fact, there is a second similar case in North Rhine-Westphalia.
On the site of the former Niederkrüchten-Elmpt military airport in the Viersen district, associations and LANUV are striving to expand the EU bird protection area "Schwalm-Nette-Platte" because ornithological studies have shown that some breeding pairs of the nightjar live in the area.
The airfield is even a designated priority wind power area with well-advanced planning.
An investor is planning a flagship energy park with battery storage, a photovoltaic ground-mounted system and seven wind turbines.
Six of them are to be built on the asphalted former runway - which is why almost no other areas would have to be sealed.
Environment Minister Oliver Krischer is probably one of the few politicians in Germany who practice ornithology as a hobby whenever possible.
The Green Party politician has a broad knowledge of ornithology, does not have to find out from his specialist department first, but can speak expertly on the spot about red kites, nightjars or gray woodpeckers.
Krischer is also well informed about the wind power project in the Sauerland - and, unlike his predecessor from the CDU, can give the forest farmers hope.
In the Diemel and Hoppecke valleys, the main focus is on the great gray shrike and the gray woodpecker, two bird species whose populations have indeed declined sharply.
"But both types are not affected by wind power, which is why, in my view, there is nothing to be said against expanding them there." Rather, targeted measures are needed
to preserve and improve their habitat.
“In the case of the great gray shrike, these are extensively managed open spaces and in the case of the gray woodpecker, natural deciduous forests.
Here, the expansion of wind energy through the financing of targeted measures to help species may ultimately even represent an opportunity for these species.”
"Wind energy is really not a major cause of the dramatic extinction of species in our country."
OLIVER KRISCHER, ENVIRONMENT MINISTER NRW
Then the green becomes fundamental.
“Wind energy is really not a major cause of the dramatic extinction of species in our country.
The causes of the extinction of species lie elsewhere - in intensive agriculture, in the escalating use of land, in the consequences of the climate crisis." Wind energy, on the other hand, is one of the decisive contributions to climate protection and thus also to species protection.
"Nevertheless, it is of course absolutely correct to keep nature reserves, national parks or near-natural forests free from the use of wind energy, which is what is happening."
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