Multicriteria analysis of the technical, environmental and social factors triggering the PIMBY principle for Wind technologies

WENDY aims at unravelling the factors triggering social acceptance of wind farms through an in-depth analysis at three dimensions: social sciences and humanities, environmental sciences and technological engineering.For that, the project will implement a series of local actions promoting the wider adoption of the project solutions, including guidelines, reports and handbooks which will be created to boost the understanding of wind farms decision making processes and enhance energy citizenship.

This will be supported by the spatial multi-criteria WENDY toolbox.

A tool able to identify the optimal turbines’ siting with the minimum environmental impact and highest social acceptance likelihood.

All developed models, methods, guidelines and tools will be implemented within 10 wind projects spread across 4 countries.

These have been selected considering: geography (north vs. south Europe), maturity stage (viability phase / planning phase / short-term operation phase / long-term operation phase); type of wind energy (onshore / offshore – floating, fixed-); and co-existence with other activities (agriculture, fisheries, energy communities).In these locations, outreach activities tailored to their specificities will be performed, creating the WENDY Knowledge Hubs which will incorporate citizens, local authorities, business owners and value chain actors of wind energy.

WENDY Hubs will serve as a baseline for the WENDY Knowledge Exchange Platform, a forum that will be developed to facilitate the exchange of knowledge between decision makers and key stakeholders within wind farms planning processes.For a successful implementation of the project activities, all the value chain and the best-in-class expertise is involved in the project consortium including 9 partners from 6 European countries: 1 Large Company (EGP), 2 SMEs (WR, Q-PLAN), 1 University (CBS), 2 RTO (CIRCE, NINA), 1 Energy Community (MEC), 2 Non-profit organisations and associations (NOWC, APPA).