European Commission: Commission kick starts work with EU national authorities to speed up permit-granting procedures for renewable energy projects

Yesterday a multi-country flagship workshop on permit-granting processes for renewable energy projects took place. The aim of the workshop was to discuss the options that Member States have in order to accelerate the permitting process, gathering the experience and good practices that have been identified at the Member State level.

The event, organised in the framework of a peer-learning tool for environment authorities TAIEX – Environmental Implementation Review, was attended by around 100high-level officials from Ministries of the Environment, Energy and related Agencies of nearly all EU Member States. It provided an opportunity to discuss challenges and remaining obstacles at national, regional and local levels in the authorisation of renewable energy projects.

Experts from Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Germany and Spain presented good practice examples related to site selection and simplified permitting procedures. Three representatives from the private sector presented examples of minimizing environmental impacts of renewable energy projects. To support Member States in identifying go-to areas for the rapid deployment of new installations for the production of energy from wind and solar renewable sources, Joint Research Centre presented its Energy and Industry Geography Lab – an online platform bringing together a wealth of information on relevant energy, industry and environmental factors. Commission speakers included officials from DG ENV, DG ENER, DG REFORM and JRC.

The workshop acknowledged that the current pace of deployment of renewable energy projects will need to be accelerated significantly to meet the needed capacity increase on time. Slow and complex permitting processes are a key obstacle to unleashing the renewables revolution.

Discussion aimed to facilitate the sharing of experience and best practices among Member States in a participatory approach together with the local and regional authorities. There is a significant potential for improvements and learning from each other and the dialogue should continue in the future.