Numerous companies from the German wind power industry have sued the authorities. They accuse them of inaction in the approval process. Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania clearly stands out with 19 cases.
Several German courts are dealing with lawsuits from companies due to delayed approval procedures for wind turbines. According to a survey by the dpa news agency, at least around 30 such lawsuits for failure to act were recently pending against authorities from companies in the industry. In most federal states, however, these are exceptions. In some cases there were no corresponding complaints as of October 1st.
Authorities have seven months for approval
Some of the proceedings involve applications from wind power companies that have not been decided for years. However, according to the Federal Wind Energy Association (BWE), the industry considers the impact of lawsuits for failure to act to be low. “Court proceedings still take a relatively long time, so actions for inaction do not necessarily lead to faster approval,” the association said upon request.
In addition, there were no lasting consequences for inaction in the authorities – such as flat-rate compensation for delays. The BWE therefore advocates for more staff in the courts to ensure faster legal proceedings.
According to the law, authorities have seven months after receipt of the complete application documents and three months in simplified procedures to make a decision. You can extend the deadline by three months, but you must justify this. The BWE criticized the fact that confirmation of completeness was often not provided or was delayed by the repeated requests for new documents. The association demanded a limit to a one-off additional request and also a deadline for confirmation of completeness.
Procedures in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania take almost 16 months
According to figures from the Federal-State Cooperation Committee, approval procedures in Germany lasted an average of nine months last year once the documents were complete. The median – an average in which, unlike the average, individual extreme values have no particular influence – is 6.4 months. According to an analysis by the onshore wind energy agency, it even takes more than two years for an approval process to be fully completed.
The length of the proceedings increases the likelihood of lawsuits for failure to act, according to the BWE. This is particularly evident in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, where there are 19 lawsuits. The average approval process there was almost 16 months. Of the states with corresponding data, only Thuringia was slower (16.3).
According to the dpa survey with feedback from almost all federal states, there have recently been no corresponding lawsuits before the responsible courts in Bavaria, Hamburg, Saarland or Saxony. According to the joint Higher Administrative Court, there were fewer than five in Berlin and Brandenburg, three in Schleswig-Holstein and two in Lower Saxony.
Several lawsuits have already been successful
Lengthy negotiations before the Higher Administrative Court of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania have already resulted in wind power planners’ favor several times this year. The presiding judge spoke, among other things, of a “ping-pong game” in the administration and emphasized the public interest in wind energy expansion.
Controversial topics in the proceedings included the protection of monuments or species or birds. According to the survey, these topics also play a role in other federal states. A request to the Schwerin Ministry of the Environment regarding the numerous complaints in the northeast recently remained unanswered.
Germany continues to lag significantly behind the demands of wind power expansion. According to the BWE, 1.9 wind turbines were built per day this year. At the beginning of the year, Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) announced that “four to five wind turbines should be added every day” by 2030. Most recently, the European Union (EU) announced that it would make the approval process for the construction of new wind farms easier and faster by the middle of next year.