Here’s the problem: Most Vermonters support renewable energy, but when it comes down to individual proposals — be it for wind turbines, solar panels or biomass plants — these projects can be divisive, controversial and unpopular. 

One solution, according to Andreas Wieg, of Berlin’s German Cooperative and Raiffeisen Federation: energy cooperatives. Along with Belgian energy consultant Dirk Vansintjan, Wieg is barnstorming through Vermont this week on behalf of the Heinrich Boell Foundation, a nonprofit that promotes civil society and a healthy environment. The pair will be in Burlington tomorrow, April 27, for a forum called “Vermont’s Energy Choices: Old Dirty Problems, Clean Energy Solutions.” 

Both European energy experts are promoting a grassroots, “bottom-up” approach to the so-called energy transition. Germany in particular has experienced meteoric growth in new cooperatives in recent years; roughly 650 new energy cooperatives have been founded in the last five years, encompassing about 100,000 members.

Wieg attributes the growth to a German law called the Renewable Energy Sources Act, which established a “feed-in tariff” system guaranteeing investors a set per-kilowatt-hour price for energy generation. (Vermont enacted a similar tariff in 2009.) Cooperatives allow residents — typically in rural areas in Germany — to band together and invest collectively in renewable energy projects.

This isn’t to say that Germans wholeheartedly embrace renewable energy development. In a telephone interview, Wieg says that, just as in Vermont, Germany has experienced backlash against proposed turbines, solar panels and biomass plants. The problem of acceptance for renewable energy — “especially for wind turbines,” Wieg says — “is a huge problem in Germany, and it is one of the key problems we must solve in the future.”

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Kathryn Flagg was a Seven Days staff writer from 2012 through 2015. She completed a fellowship in environmental journalism at Middlebury College, and her work has also appeared in the Addison County Independent, Wyoming Public Radio and Orion Magazine.

4 replies on “Could Germany’s “Bottom-Up” Approach to Renewable Energy Work in Vermont?”

  1. Did you miss the part where Canadians bought all our Hydro and Power Companies? They want to build a fracking pipeline through my neighbor’s garden? Blow up mountain tops? Did you tell the Deutsche? No matter, They did not sell their power to another country.

  2. You got something against Canada? It’s a friendly, rational, democratic country. I have no concerns about them owning a Vermont electric company and Vermont Gas. It’s not like they’re the Middle East — unfriendly and unstable. In fact, I’m guessing you think we should probably emulate their national health care system. So why the hypocritical xenophobia when it comes to electricity and gas?

  3. I have Nothing against Canadians. This is not about health care. Some of my best friends are Canadian. I have an issue with any One entity owning our entire power supply. I have issues with them being called “Green Mountain Power” now, like Vermont Maple Syrup. Call it by who owns it. I have Major issues with their “imminent domain” Bullish attitude about laying high pressure fracking Gaz Transmission lines in Monkton (Canada to NY under the lake-through-we get no gaz) and through my neighbor’s garden. Sorry, Not Xenophobic. Living in an idyllic town with high taxes, conserved lands and they want to run this line through.

  4. The environment around the south Scandinavian and north German towns is totally destroyed by those wind turbine towers. These are not environmentally friendly.

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