There is a ruling that strikes a chord in favor of renewable energies. The Supreme Court has ruled in favor of the Paredes de Nava City Council (Palencia) being able to implement a ‘green’ energy project on a community property dedicated to agricultural activity by responding to a purpose of social interest.
It all started in 2021, when the council agreed to delimit part of a communal property, dedicated to date entirely to traditional agricultural use, to implement a renewable energy project, and award it at public auction through a price to third parties who take care of the condition. . of neighbors. Specifically, the rights to use the property, called ‘El Páramo’, expired in September of that year. It has almost 950 hectares and 460 were marked off for possible industrial use, with the specific purpose of implementing a renewable project.
In this way, more than half of the land could continue to be dedicated to traditional agricultural use. Furthermore, the returns from the renewable installation would be used, first of all, to improve the unbounded surface, benefiting the owners (71 residents of a population of nearly 2,000 inhabitants). However, the Local Agrarian Board appealed and the Superior Court of Justice of Castilla y León agreed, annulling both the municipal agreement and the order of the Ministry of the Presidency of the autonomous community that endorsed the decision.
Committed to the environment
The City Council did not give up and went to the High Court. The ruling states that it is a limitation that responds to a purpose of social interest, such as the promotion of renewable energies, which is directly linked to the protection of the environment and the development objectives of such energies established in the Law. 7/2021, of May 20, on climate change, in compliance with the emissions reduction commitments derived from European law and the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change.
On the other hand, the ruling indicates that the legitimate purpose to which the boundary is intended to be dedicated, the installation of photovoltaic plants and wind farms, imposes requirements derived from sectoral legislation with the essential technical, professional and financial qualifications and training, “which make 75 TRLRL, that is, in auction through price even to third parties who do not have the status of neighbors.”
What benefits does a renewable plant have for a municipality?
José Antonio García-Noblejas, legal advisor of Viridi, explains to La Información that the installation of renewable energy, as well as the entire processing process that it entails, must comply with the provisions of the standard. Among the benefits that energy development can have for the municipality, García-Noblejas highlights the following:
– Municipal collection derived from the payment of the building license, ICIO, urban planning fee, etc.
– Social impact with the creation of direct and indirect jobs, training courses, creation of a job bank.
– Collaboration with environmental, agricultural and cultural associations.
– Improvement of the environment through the creation of species conservation habitats, maintenance of surface areas for crops, increase of trophic resources, as well as regeneration of biodiversity.
“Stage of prosperity and improvement in everyone’s living conditions”
Paredes de Nava will be able to receive an annual income of 600,000 per year thanks to the development of the renewable plant, in addition to the corresponding associated jobs, according to the local media Palencia en la Red. “Pleasant feeling that, after the difficult path taken, it is finally Justice has been done, with the certainty that this endorsement granted by the Supreme Court will usher in a stage of prosperity and improvement in the living conditions of all Pareños, which constitutes one more tool in the fight against depopulation that this The municipality supports it tirelessly,” the City Council said in a statement.
Along the same lines, he assured that the ruling settles the “false debate” promoted by those who have sought to transcend the litigation to “a generic dichotomy between the agricultural sector and the renewable energy industry.”
Challenges of ‘bioagrovoltaics’ in Spain
The Spanish Photovoltaic Union (UNEF), the majority sector association for solar energy in Spain, has prepared a report in which it highlights the main challenges and barriers faced by ‘bioagrovoltaics’. One of the most important, and which concerns the case of the municipality of Palencia, is to improve social acceptance and knowledge about the benefits of implementing photovoltaic systems in combination with agricultural activities. In this sense, the association highlights that the agricultural sector’s confidence in photovoltaics must be generated and improved through solutions based on bioagrivoltaics, using proven and reliable information on the benefits of this practice on the crop.
It also highlights the importance of building meeting spaces between farmers and project promoters to share information, train and socialize the benefits of a photovoltaic project as a complementary activity to agriculture. To this end, it calls for promoting coordinated work between the Ministry of Ecological Transition and Demographic Challenge with the Ministry of Agriculture to develop a regulatory framework that serves as a catalyst for photovoltaic integration with agricultural activity.
