Renewable Energy and Rural Communities

Alister Kratt, Director at LDA Design

Climate change is upon us and society’s responses to that change are critical if we are to sustain the wonderful natural environment we have been gifted and which sustains society and our economy.  Places change over time, sometimes slowly, sometimes more accelerated. Without adequate planning and meaningful engagement with communities, we may end up somewhere we didn’t intend to be and with change that is neither understood nor adopted and certainly not reassuringly familiar. With good planning and by bringing communities on the journey of change, we can head towards an outcome for all of society  that we understand, need  and want  rather than one that is ‘imposed’.

The Welsh landscape is a canvas upon which the history of our society’s progress has been painted. It has changed over time. Our landscapes are complex, reflecting humans’ interaction with and imposition on them. Our landscapes can be considered from many perspectives; a canvas, a resource, a place, an asset – landscapes of beauty, leisure, home, industry, power, commerce and nature. Society’s interaction with our landscapes is rich, and our understanding should be similarly so. As a culture, we need to manage change well, plan and have processes in place to support good outcomes that are welcomed by rural communities who can often be the host for energy projects that support the urban population.

 

Welsh policy, founded on the Well-being of Future Generations Act, calls for society to sustain our present and future generations. The policy could be summarised as behaving as a society with enlightened community interest - we further our community interests whilst also serving the interests of others. What enables this to happen when we consider the provision of energy for the Welsh nation?

Society consumes energy and the provision of carbon-free energy is key to support how we arrest the speed of climate change to support resilience, powering towns and villages across the devolved nation. But how can communities engage with, and ‘welcome’, that change as part of a refreshed and positive cynefin, reflecting a wider societal need/dependence that engages with the potential for good and tangible outcomes for rural communities ?

There are opportunities to not only respond to existing landscape character and sense of place when we plan our renewable energy and network infrastructure that supports it, but to contemplate a positive alteration in character and cynefin – a transformation, a positive productive landscape that not only harvests power from the sun and the wind but at the same time addresses nature recovery, addresses wider natural environment systems and supports sometimes struggling rural communities.

It is possible to plan towards a future positive outcome with transformational change. In an environment where individual energy projects are promoted through the planning system and converge into a single national power network, we need to plan for appropriate and democratic outcomes and reliance on a strong planning system, strategic scaled spatial planning,  strategic vision and responsible energy development promotion.

While local energy-generating initiatives play an important part in society’s response and community energy projects are promoted as part of regionally/ national scaled renewable energy projects, there is a need for strategic direction to scale up and or coordinate the response at a regional or national level to support and power society. How that national response ‘lands’ within a community, which may be considered to be disproportionate to local need, is key. The promotion of Development of National Significance (DNS) and Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects (NSIPs) promoted through the Development Consent Order (DCO) process, which seek to deliver  such nationally scaled projects , are structured to support an appropriate front-loaded or enhanced planning process that relies on upfront engagement to inform projects to support community and stakeholder adoption/ buy-in, with or without the benefit of a ‘community benefit fund’.

Welsh planning policy and guidance is increasingly well founded and structured to  support a coordinated strategic approach that should be endorsed and followed through to delivery. The latter is the most challenging. It is fine to be principled and be well armed with policy and guidance, but ambition must translate to practical delivery, good process and a focus on positive outcomes. So what is in place to underpin a positive outcome? Perhaps of greatest relevance to rural communities working at a local level, are the Energy Area Statements, which could be more coordinated and aligned with the uptake of Place Plans to inform how a community can help shape its future cynefin and support positive transformational outcomes and secure tangible benefits.

In my essay in ‘A National Vision’, published in ‘Landmarks’ published by DCfW in 2015, I noted the importance of vision, drawing attention to how it can liberate communities and society - Landmarks Publication - Design Commission for Wales.

With the announcement of Labour’s UK National Infrastructure Strategy, due for publication in 2025, I hope that the strategy will have a strong vision and spatial dimension and extend across the entire UK. In combination with the strong Welsh policy framework in Future Wales, which cascades policy from strategic to local, we are perhaps at the start of strategic ‘top-down’ spatial planning that will support ‘bottom-up’ community engagement and vision of place and engage project promoters in good process and outcomes. With combined endeavour, such an approach should be capable of  securing good  outcomes that address an existing and future sense of place  a sense of belonging and an expression of enlightened community interest   that supports society’s needs for the delivery of renewable energy for the better good.

 

Feature Image: Renewable energy - culturally understood, adopted and reassuringly familiar - a transformational cynefin that supports communities 

The image seeks to express renewable energy as part of the landscape - culturally understood, adopted and considered to be reassuringly familiar - in support on a transformational cynefin:

Weaving renewable energy into the cynefin of the Welsh landscape traversing through the social and ecological terrain forming part of the landscape rather than something merely imposed upon it. The sun farmed by solar arrays and the wind isobars dancing their way through the wind turbines which harvest the power of the wind. The canvas of the Welsh landscape has long been expressed in paintings with the cultural, industrial and ecological nuances. This narrative drawing seeks to express the future.