Energy landscapes of today and tomorrow
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nergy, Sustainability and Society
Open Access
EDITORIAL
Energy landscapes of today and tomorrow Daniela Thrän1,2, Erik Gawel1 and Dagmar Fiedler1*
Keywords: Energy landscapes, Germany’s "Energiewende", Renewable energy sources (RES), Sustainable development, Transition of energy systems The transition of energy systems toward renewable energy sources (RES) is a key issue for sustainable development. To execute this transformation, a tremendous number of renewable energy provision as well as infrastructure units are necessary. Thus, new energy landscapes will emerge changing energy provision from “energy for space” to “energy from space”. Such energy landscapes not only include traditional landscape patterns, but also renewable resource potentials, conversion units and related infrastructure, and also humans being affected by the transition in very different ways: as investors, neighbours, local decision-makers, energy consumers and many more. Likewise, landscapes need to secure manifold functions such as food and material provision, nature protection and recovery. With increasing RES shares, a variety of sustainability challenges have become evident: consideration of the limited land availability by combining material and energy use in agriculture, unlocked potentials to increase local energy efficiency and awareness of concerns associated with the spatioecological and spatio-social effects of RES deployment (land use conflicts, public acceptance, NIMBY). Hence, spatial disutility should be taken into account when using energy landscapes for decentralized energy provision. Thus, the spatial dimension of the “Energiewende” turns out to be an important issue of further interdisciplinary research. Regional and spatial analyses need to complement the traditional energy systems research. They may contribute to understanding the various drivers of regionally specific RES deployment, identifying regional *Correspondence: [email protected] 1 UFZ–Helmholtz-Zentrum für Umweltforschung GmbH, Leipzig, Permoserstrasse 15, 04318 Leipzig, Germany Full list of author information is available at the end of the article
and local patterns, e.g. of environmental impacts, developing and integrating methods of spatial modelling, conducting spatial optimizations and respective conflict management, developing innovative spatially explicit governance concepts. In light of this, addressing the manifold challenges connected with newly emerging energy landscapes and exploring possible solutions was the focus of the UFZ Energy Days 2018 held in Leipzig from the 24–25 September 2018. This article collection originates from a selection of papers based upon presentations at the Energy Days. It aims at fostering the exchange between energy research at the UFZ and the national and international scientific community. It is with pleasure and pride that we not only present the carefully reviewed and edited conference papers in this special issue of Energy, Sustainability and Society, but also some recent novel papers from this area, giving our
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