Ambitious onshore renewable energy deployment does not exacerbate future UK land-use challenges

Abstract

Summary: Transitioning to renewable energy is crucial for meeting net-zero targets to tackle the climate crisis. Although wind and solar are the main generation methods being pursued, they risk exacerbating future land-use challenges. Here, we explore the UK’s land capacity to accommodate two levels of increased future onshore wind and solar energy capacity. We quantify the impact on breeding bird habitat, food production, and net greenhouse gas flux in the presence and absence of a range of nature-based climate change mitigation measures. We find that even the highest onshore renewable energy ambitions require only a small fraction of the suitable land area, with little cost to food production, greenhouse gas sequestration, or breeding birds, even under pessimistic modeling assumptions. Therefore, the UK could boost onshore renewables without contributing substantially to future land competition, especially if potential synergies between multiple land uses, such as cropping and solar, are realized. Science for society: A transition to renewable energy can help mitigate global climate change. However, the widespread deployment of wind and solar technologies raises concerns about their impacts, from visual amenity to food production. Further, the renewable transition alone is insufficient to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions. We need active removal of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere as well as emissions reductions. Such removals can be enabled by nature-based solutions, such as habitat creation and restoration, which concurrently help biodiversity. In a UK case study, we show that ambitious renewable deployment targets require little land, in addition to what is needed for nature-based solutions, and can avoid the most productive farmland to minimize the impact on food production. Even in such a densely populated country with many competing land-use interests, integrated land-use decisions could help to simultaneously achieve net-zero targets, nature recovery, and maintenance of food production.

Keywords

• wind power
• solar power
• climate change mitigation
• biodiversity conservation
• birds
• agriculture