WindChoir - Tool for strategic planning by assessing the cumulative environmental impact of wind power

Research Project, 2018 – 2020

Large-scale expansion of wind power means that new and large areas are used. Localization of new parks depends partly on the physical and infrastructure conditions of the landscape and partly on other activities, plans, and natural environments. Just environmental impact, especially the cumulative environmental impact, is often difficult to quantify at an early stage. For good strategic planning, however, it is important to look at the whole and to compare the environmental impact of deployment scenarios nationally, regionally and from a landscape perspective. In this project, we develop a transparent tool for assessing and comparing the overall, cumulative, environmental impact for different land and sea deployment scenarios. The tool focuses on the comparison of environmental impacts but also takes into account economic, technical and health-environmental factors and is based on a scientifically established spatial assessment method used in Swedish maritime planning.