International trade in electricity from renewable sources can offer a flexible means by which EU member states can meet their country targets but to date in Ireland initiatives to build wind farms ...for export have been resolutely contested by affected communities. Using a discrete choice experiment (DCE), a survey of respondents living within 10 km of an existing wind farm is conducted to estimate the social impact of wind turbines designed to produce electricity for export under different levels of financial benefit and participation. Most respondents are willing to make trade-offs to allow for an export market but financial compensation required is greater for exports compared to domestic supply. Respondents prefer greater levels of participation than currently offered but favour moderate levels of participation in the absence of financial benefits. Respondents that had a positive experience of living next to an existing wind farm in terms of financial benefits, employment and community representation are generally more accepting of wind farms. Conversely, subjects with a strong sense of place attachment or a less convincing experience in terms of financial benefits and participation were less tolerant of wind farms and more likely to pick the status quo of no new wind farm development.
•We estimate the social impact of wind energy exports on local residents in Ireland.•We examine the impact of local experience on attitudes to wind energy.•Distributive justice is found to be an important determinant of acceptance.•Moderate community engagement is preferred to more heavily involved participation.•Community representation and benefits based on setback distance are recommended.
In Ireland the deployment of onshore wind turbines has become progressively more difficult in some areas because of the potential negative externalities associated with their operation. Using a ...discrete choice experiment (DCE) we employ a willingness to accept framework to estimate the external effects of wind turbines on local residents with the inclusion of community consultation and to quantify the compensation required to permit wind farms to be built in Ireland. Our findings reveal that the majority of respondents are willing to make (monetary) tradeoffs to allow for wind power initiatives and we find that respondents require less compensation if provision is made for a community representative and setback distance is increased.
•We measure the effect of wind farm externalities on local residents in Ireland•We examine the impact of these externalities if community consultation is provided•A community rep significantly increases the acceptance of wind farm developments•Moderate changes in setback distance also increases acceptance•The inclusion of a rep and adjustments to setback are recommended for policymakers
The purpose of this work is to explore the extent to which wind farm planning approvals in the Republic of Ireland are influenced by project technology, institutional processes, and site endowments. ...We use principal components data reduction, z-score data normalization, and Probit regression analyses on a unique revealed preference dataset covering 354 wind farm applications and planning authority decisions between 1990 and 2011. Notably, a unique measure of variable importance is employed that mitigates statistical problems and allows for the ranking of predictors according to their relative influences. Findings reveal that the duration of the local appeal process, decisions of local authorities and inspectors, identities of the appellants, and, projects that conflict with strategic development plans or generate visual externalities emerge as key influences affecting planning approval. Project technology features such as area, rated output capacity, and hub height, as well as site wind endowments, appear to be of less but significant importance. Alternatively, we find that proximity to dwellings, towns, or protected habitats does not influence planning outcomes.
•We investigate wind farm planning approvals in the Republic of Ireland.•We find that local decisions, process durations, and appellant identities matter.•Project technology and visual or strategic development objections matter less.•Proximity to dwellings, towns or protected habitats does not matter.
Willingness to pay to protect cold water corals Armstrong, Claire W.; Aanesen, Margrethe; Rensburg, Thomas M. ...
Conservation biology,
December 2019, Letnik:
33, Številka:
6
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
There is increasing pressure to use currently untapped resources in the deep sea, raising questions regarding ecosystem service trade‐offs in these often unknown areas. We assessed the trade‐offs ...between protection of cold‐water coral reefs and economic activities, such as fisheries and petroleum extraction, through a survey of a representative sample of the populations of Norway and Ireland. Choice‐experiment surveys were conducted in workshop settings and through the internet. Both survey approaches provided some similar results, such as preferences for protection. Our cross‐country comparison showed the general public in Norway and Ireland was willing, despite possible conflict with extractive and consumptive economic activities in the deep sea, to protect cold‐water corals as habitat for fish. On average, people were willing to pay NKr 341 and NKr 424 for a small and large increase in protected areas respectively, and NKr 880 if the area is important habitat for fish, all else held equal. However, there was large variation across individuals and countries. Norwegian respondents valued pure existence of cold‐water corals more than the Irish respondents, and the latter were less willing to trade off industrial activities than the former. Nonetheless, the findings support conservation of cold‐water corals and more generally of ocean environments that provide habitat for fish, which the current deep sea governance systems are not adequately designed or sufficiently well‐structured to secure.
Resumen
Existe una creciente presión por el uso correcto de recursos NO EXPLOTADOS en los mares profundos, lo que genera preguntas con respecto a las compensaciones de los servicios ambientales en los ecosistemas de estas áreas comúnmente desconocidas. Evaluamos las compensaciones entre la protección de los arrecifes de coral de aguas frías y las actividades económicas, como las pesquerías y la extracción de petróleo, por medio de un censo de muestras representativas de las poblaciones de Noruega e Irlanda. Las encuestas de experimento de elección se realizaron dentro de talleres y por medio del internet. Ambas estrategias de encuesta proporcionaron algunos resultados similares, como la preferencia por la protección. Nuestra comparación entre países mostró que el público en general en Noruega y en Irlanda estaba dispuesto, a pesar del posible conflicto con las actividades económicas de extracción y de consumo en el mar profundo, a proteger los corales de aguas frías como hábitat para peces. En promedio, las personas estuvieron dispuestas a pagar 341 coronas noruegas (NKr) y NKr 424 por un incremento menor y mayor respectivamente de las áreas protegidas y NKr 880 si el área es un hábitat importante para los peces, todo lo demás se mantuvo igual. Sin embargo, hubo una gran variación entre individuos y países. Los respondientes noruegos valoraron la pura existencia de los corales de aguas frías más que los respondientes irlandeses, y estos últimos tuvieron menos disposición que los primeros para compensar las actividades industriales. Sin embargo, nuestros resultados respaldan la conservación de los corales de aguas frías y, con mayor generalidad, de los ambientes oceánicos que proporcionan un hábitat para los peces, para lo cual los sistemas de la actual gobernanza del mar profundo no están diseñados adecuadamente o estructurados suficientemente para asegurar esto.
关键词
随着对尚未开发的深海资源进行利用的压力与日俱增,这些不为人知的地区的生态系统服务利弊权衡问题也开始涌现。我们通过在挪威和爱尔兰进行代表性抽样调查, 评估了冷水珊瑚礁保护与渔业、石油开采等经济活动之间的利弊权衡。我们分别在研讨会和网络上开展了选择实验调查, 这两种方法在保护的偏好性等方面得到了相似结果。跨国家比较分析显示, 挪威和爱尔兰的公众愿意保护作为鱼类栖息地的珊瑚礁, 即使保护行动可能与深海开采及消费经济活动相冲突。为实现保护地面积的小幅增长和大幅增长, 人们平均来说分别愿意支付 341 和 424 挪威克朗, 在其它条件不变的情况下，愿意为鱼类重要栖息地的保护支付 880 挪威克朗。然而, 这些金额在个体和国家水平都存在很大差异。与爱尔兰受访者相比, 挪威人民更看重冷水珊瑚的存在本身, 而爱尔兰受访者则更不愿意为保护牺牲工业发展。尽管如此, 我们的研究结果还是支持了冷水珊瑚礁和作为鱼类栖息的海洋环境的保护, 但目前还缺少设计充分、结构完善的的深海管理系统来提供相应保障。【翻译: 胡怡思; 审校: 聂永刚】
Article impact statement: There is broad public support for nonuse values of cold‐water corals and for securing supporting services for fish.
Due to Ireland's abundant wind resources, the Irish government are focussing primarily on wind energy to meet renewable electricity targets. However, due to intermittent wind speeds, the energy ...generated cannot be scheduled as consistently as conventional fuel sources, impacting power system security and stability. Developing wind energy that internalises intermittency could provide positive public impacts in the form of reduced emissions, increased renewable energy capacity and energy security but can also have negative impacts in the form of increased costs, visual disamenities, environmental impacts and reduced autarky, amongst others. Few studies elicit public preferences for the development of wind energy that takes account of intermittency. Using focus groups and a discrete choice experiment involving four latent classes as part of a national survey of 1107 members of the public in Ireland, we evaluate public preferences for wind energy development that mitigates wind energy variability through electricity trade, battery storage, and demand side management. We observe substantial heterogeneity with respect to preferences for wind energy development with intermittency solutions. Approximately 62 % of the sample derive positive utility from all solutions, appear unconcerned about the potential negative impacts of renewable energy infrastructure and display pro-wind energy sentiment. However, 38 % do not derive utility from most or all of the solutions. The vast majority of our respondents; approximately 94 %; support measures to compensate affected individuals for near neighbour externalities associated with wind power generation using local benefit funds even at a personal cost to themselves.
Although international trade in energy may offer a flexible and cost effective means by which European countries could meet their renewable energy targets, developers in the exporting nation can face ...local opposition for reasons which are not always clear. Using focus groups and a public survey, we contrast perspectives between local stakeholders and wind farm operators and investigate the community impacts associated with large-scale wind energy for domestic use and export from Ireland to the UK. Although the export of renewable energy from Ireland to the UK is currently on hold, our findings suggest that significant investment is required by the state and wind farm operators in better information provision, trust building, effective instruments to internalise wind farm externalities and co-management arrangements before Ireland can fully capture the benefits of wind exports to the UK.
► We model 20 farms in the Irish Burren area whose farming practices provide uncompensated amenity externalities. ► We simulate the land-use response of these producers to variations in program ...funding and market conditions. ► Our results indicate that heterogeneous preferences influence producers’ decisions to provide public good amenities. ► Producers are most sensitive to semi-organic product price premia, off-farm labor market conditions, and subsidy payments. ► Government support payments provide a societal rate of return exceeding 71% and may be as high as 185%.
Agri-environmental schemes designed to induce agricultural producers to provide environmental public goods must increasingly justify exchequer costs. This requires comparing the non-market value of amenity externalities with government expenditures. We employ a preference calibrated micro-simulation model to analyze the economic viability of a grass roots agri-environment scheme in the West of Ireland. We also simulate the land-use response of individual producers to variations in program funding and market conditions. Our results indicate that heterogeneous preferences crucially influence producers’ decisions to provide environmental public goods; producers are highly sensitive to market and policy incentives, in particular to semi-organic product price premia, off-farm labor market conditions, and subsidy payments; and finally, even in the most unfavorable simulated market conditions, support payments provide a rate of return exceeding 71% and in current conditions provide returns as high as 185%.
Contrary to conventional stated preference valuation techniques that employ a direct questioning approach, the inferred valuation method utilises indirect questioning where respondents are asked for ...their belief regarding others’ values for a good or service. In this study, using choice experiments, we compare the results obtained through the two valuation techniques for environmental features of the Burren landscape in western Ireland. Consistent with previous studies, stated values using the conventional approach are found to be significantly higher than those obtained through the inferred valuation approach. In particular, this study highlights the dissimilarities in relative preferences observed between the two landscape attributes (rocky limestone pavements and orchid‐rich grasslands) from the two questioning formats. While respondents were indifferent between the two habitats, they believed the ‘average other’ to be significantly more concerned about the conservation of the rocky limestone pavements. We attribute this divergence in preferences to be a consequence of additional normative motives perceived by respondents with regard to the conservation of orchid‐rich grasslands.
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