Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
is much easier to accept a little noise and the view of a turbine if it reminds
you of the fact that the turbine gives you money when the wind blows.”
97
Economic aluence in Denmark has fostered progressively lofty environ-
mental expectations. In energy circles, this has manifested itself through
the emergence of pro-wind lobby groups such as the Wind Mill Owners
Association, which has substantially inluenced national energy policy.
Moreover, in the 1970s, two highly inluential anti-nuclear power groups
emerged—the Organization Against Nuclear Power and the Organization
for Renewable Energy—and they proved to be successful in dissuading
Denmark's policymakers from acting on nuclear power development aspira-
tions.
98
At its zenith, the anti-nuclear power movement had attracted over
30,000 members and contributed to wind power assuming a mantle as the
preferred alternative energy technology.
99
Public support for wind power in Denmark extended beyond rhetoric. A
majority of citizens were willing to pay extra to support environmentally
benign energy systems.
100
his allowed the government to pass through the
cost of wind power subsidization to the end-consumer in the form of envi-
ronmental premiums, which made electricity in Denmark approximately
50% more expensive than neighboring countries were paying.
101
Public
acquiescence in regard to accepting higher energy costs proved to be instru-
mental to wind power development in the 1980s, when the decline of oil
prices would have made it hard for wind power to compete on a level mar-
ket basis. Similarly, without public economic concessions that enabled the
incorporation of carbon pricing into the cost of electricity, the resurgence of
wind power in the late 2000s might not have been possible.
4.4.2 Economic Landscape
he two oil shocks of the 1970s hit Denmark particularly hard, because
over 90% of its electricity generation came from oil-ired power plants.
Not only did the shocks catalyze a search for alternative forms of energy,
it also helped entrench public acquiescence to accept higher energy costs
in order to transition away from dependence on an energy source (oil) over
which there was no domestic control. Ideologically, the choice came down
to enduring the capricious nature of fossil fuel costs or accepting the more
stable yet comparatively higher costs of wind power.
In contrast to oil, which prior to the discoveries in the North Sea was mostly
imported, there were also direct economic side beneits associated with wind
power. Not only would Danish individuals and groups have an opportunity
to invest in (and inancially beneit from) wind energy projects, but domestic
