Abruzzo’s municipalities show high degree of participation in the Covenant of Mayors, the European network which aims to promote renewable energy and energy efficiency initiatives at the municipal level. This reflects the regional government’s goal of a renewable energy action plan in each municipality. An action plan allows municipalities to access European and national subsidies for renewable energy deployment. As a result several municipalities have been able to deploy small-scale renewable energy installations. This provides long-term revenue which can be reinvested to satisfy specific needs, such as refurbishing a local school or renovating senior residences. Because of the close involvement of local communities, and explicit regional rules to preserve the landscape, renewable enery installations are usually scaled to fit the local landscape without causing a dramatic and sudden change.
The paper provides three main findings: i) Taking aesthetic as well technical considerations into account when siting renewable energy installations can help integrate them better into rural landscapes. ii) Linking renewable energy deployment to tangible benefits for the hosting community, such as better public services, improves public support dramatically. iii) Without a framework of co-ordination to benefit from economies of scale, a large number of small initiatives do not necessarily have the same impact on the regional economy as fewer large-scale initiatives.
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