Hamburg

First BESTGRID workshop "The Future of Social Acceptance"

The majority of project developers and public authorities in Europe recognise the need to better inform and engage stakeholders when planning a new power line. Nonetheless, public opposition still develops to a great extent in some locations. For example, the BESTGRID pilot project SuedLink has recently stirred controversial discussions. Public irritation has fostered a political debate on the need for SuedLink and other major grid projects, partially withdrawing previously existing political support.

This situation provokes new questions that we discussed during our first public BESTGRID workshop on 21 May 2014 in Hamburg.

Agenda

09:00 Registration, tea & coffee

09:30 Welcome
Antonella Battaglini | RGI
Dr. Christian Schneller | TenneT

09:45 What is BESTGRID?
Antina Sander | RGI/ Project Leader BESTGRID | Presentation

10:00 SuedLink – BESTGRID pilot project 1
Dr. Christian Schneller and Marius Strecker | TenneT | Presentation 
Rotraud Hänlein | Germanwatch | Presentation

11:00 Tea & coffee

11:30 Braine-l’Alleud – Waterloo – BESTGRID pilot project 2
Valérie Legat | Elia
Valérie Xhonneux | Fédération Inter-Environnement Wallonie | Presentation  

12:30 Networking lunch

13:30 Parallel discussion sessions:

Session 1 
EU-sponsored study on raising public acceptance for grid extension: Online toolkit for increased stakeholder dialogue as major result
Impulse speaker: Markus Kaufmann, Roland Berger Strategy Consultants | Presentation

Session 2 
Innovative participatory approaches – can they support formal planning procedures?
Impulse speaker: Mathis Danelzik, Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities (KWI Essen) | Presentation

Session 3 
Energy and democracy – from participation to ownership?
Impulse speakers: 
Molly Walsh, Friends of the Earth and Project Leader of EU project ‘Community Power: enabling legislation to increase public acceptance for RES projects across Europe’ | Presentation
Viktoria Matkovskaia, Berlin Energie (Berlin state agency that is applying to repurchase the Berlin distribution grid)

15:00 Tea & coffee 

15:30 Report of discussion session

16:00 Panel discussion: The future of social acceptance and lessons learned from Bavaria

•    Marius Strecker, TenneT
•    Rotraud Hänlein, Germanwatch 
•    Mathis Danelzik, Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities (KWI Essen)
•    Michael Schultz, German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy 

17:00 End of workshop

Photo gallery

Material

Event partners

Funding

Contact

Theresa Schneider
Senior Manager–Communication

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t: +49 30 7677194 55
theresa@renewables-grid.eu

RGI gratefully acknowledges the EU LIFE funding support:

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Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the LIFE Programme. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.