The German online Nordwest Zeitung (NWZ) reports here how mainly German Socialists and Greens (of all people) are moving to relax strict laws designed to protect nature and endangered species.
The aim is to clear the way to industrialize the North German rural countryside and natural areas with wind turbines.
Pushed by Germany’s Greens and Socialists, the country’s nature protection act to be watered down to make the industrialization of natural areas far easier. Image cropped from here.
Journalist Marco Seng reports that under the existing law a planned wind park near the town of Zetel, for example, will have to remain shut down for 6 months every year in order to protect the area birdlife. However, denying wind park construction and operation in order to protect nature and wildlife has become just too much to ask of Germany’s socialists and environmentalist greens.
They are now pushing through a watered-down law.
Each year in early spring a number of bird species transit through or nest in north German regions, which wind park developers and operators happen to find ideal wor wind energy generation. That’s a big problem. Under the current federal law wind turbines located in sensitive areas are required to shut down from March 1 to August 30 in order to comply with ¬ß 44 of the German Nature Protection Act.
Seng reports how a number of turbines are planned to be erected in different areas this year. For example the county of Friesland gave its approval in early January to rezone the areas by the end of March and allow the construction of turbines. Citizens groups however have protested, claiming that the turbines will not be profitable due to the summer shutdown period. Yet the mayors insist they will still make a profit and the projects will go ahead.
All this is highly controversial as the NWZ writes that recent studies and expert assessments have concluded that “many bird species are threatened, foremost predatory birds because they do not avoid turbines“.
