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Switzerland’s largest wind farm, which sits atop a ridge within the Jura mountains on the French border, consists of simply 16 generators — small in comparison with different European international locations.
The rich Alpine nation has mentioned it desires to quickly speed up the event of renewable vitality sources because it strives to realize its carbon neutrality goal by 2050.
The authorities need to use a brand new local weather invoice permitted final 12 months to spice up the present small contribution of wind and solar energy to Switzerland’s vitality combine.
But that plan may hit a snag: the invoice is being challenged in a nationwide referendum on Sunday, which may forestall its implementation subsequent January.
While most environmental organizations assist the legislation and its ambitions, a number of small teams have obtained sufficient signatures to set off a referendum underneath Switzerland’s direct democracy system, amongst fears that it’ll fast-track main vitality initiatives and trigger “pointless destruction of landscapes”.
Switzerland’s largest occasion, the onerous proper Swiss People’s Party (SVP), additionally supported the vote, warning that implementing the legislation would threaten Swiss vitality safety.
“It isn’t with the renewable vitality produced on the Jura mountain tops that we handle to ensure the safety of provide,” Yvan Pahud, an SVP parliamentarian, advised AFP.
The SVP helps extra nuclear energy as a substitute.
– Sacrificing nature? –
Pierre-Alain Bruchez, who sponsored the referendum, rejected the concept of ​​putting in extra photo voltaic panels on excessive mountain views.
The retired economist mentioned he launched his battle after studying of the “horror” of the Grengiols-Solar undertaking, which goals to put in some 230,000 photo voltaic panels within the mountainous Wallis canton, at an altitude of two,500 meters.
“We should not sacrifice nature on the altar of local weather change,” he advised AFP.
Vera Weber, president of the Franz Weber Foundation for Nature and Animal Protection, which additionally referred to as for the referendum, agreed.
“This legislation weakens environmental safety in Switzerland,” he advised AFP.
Despite these arguments, repealing the legislation could be troublesome.
Sunday’s vote comes lower than two months after Switzerland grew to become the primary nation to be condemned by a world court docket for not doing sufficient in opposition to local weather change.
The ruling by the European Court of Human Rights seems to have surprised the Swiss public, the place 73 % of voters polled not too long ago mentioned they supported the legislation.
– More positives than negatives –
The invoice is geared toward quickly growing hydro, wind and photo voltaic manufacturing, and it clears the way in which for a simplified approval course of for main initiatives.
As for solar energy, the primary function is to put in panels on roofs and constructing facades.
The Swiss authorities, which helps the legislation, acknowledged that court docket appeals in opposition to renewable vitality initiatives “could also be much less profitable than earlier than”.
However, it emphasizes that enormous installations in “biotopes of nationwide significance” and in migratory chook reserves will stay prohibited, though with some exceptions.
WWF, which is among the many environmental teams supporting the legislation, pressured that the invoice requires “greater than 80 % of the deliberate growth of renewable vitality to undergo photo voltaic in present buildings”.
WWF professional Patrick Hofstetter added that “efficient measures in opposition to electrical waste have lastly been launched”.
“From our perspective, the advantages of the undertaking clearly outweigh” the negatives, he mentioned.
– Overcome dependence on fossil fuels –
The Swiss chapter of Greenpeace mentioned the legislation would assist Switzerland “overcome its dependence on fossil fuels equivalent to oil and fuel, which frequently come from bellicose states”.
Jaqueline de Quattro, a Liberal occasion parliamentarian, agreed.
Switzerland, he identified, spends eight billion Swiss francs ($8.9 billion) a 12 months “on undemocratic fossil imports equivalent to Russian fuel, or oil from Arab international locations”.
Given how assured the Swiss are within the consolation that vitality brings, he advised AFP, “we even have to just accept on occasion to see a wind turbine on the horizon”.
apo/nl/rjm/lth
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