Dylan offers no definitive answers, nor can they be found in the debate over wind energy. That is by saying; For some, the answer is provided in advance.
After plans for a new wind farm in the old municipality of Skirkstad became known, Roodt Bodø proposed that the city council make a decision in principle as soon as possible that wind energy is not welcome in Bodø.
It can be said that Rødt will get stuck on the ground before the plans have time to get wind in the windmill wings.
This is completely understandable. Red is the only party in Parliament that opposes all forms of wind energy, both onshore and offshore.
At the last national meeting held in the spring, an overwhelming majority said: No to opening up to offshore wind.
This is despite calls to the contrary from the party's manifesto committee, Red Youth leader and union leader Jörn Igum.
Igum delivered a welcome address at the national meeting where he urgently asked the party to turn the tide on the offshore wind issue. “I hope that the energy crisis will lead Rødt to reconsider its policy on offshore wind,” the union president said.
While Albert Beekhus from Rød Ungdom believes that investing in offshore wind is important for the industry, for a just green transition and access to renewable energy.
However, 128 out of 187 delegates voted against opening up to offshore wind.
This is how things might go when identity politics becomes more important than industrial politics.
This is certainly a bit strange for a party that still claims to be grounded in Marxist principles, but this must be Roodt's dilemma.
When it comes to onshore wind energy, the party is in line with other parties and public opinion.
That is by saying; Public opinion is more ambiguous. If you ask in general whether wind energy is actually the majority in favor.
As in an opinion poll conducted by AN in September 2022, where 46 percent of residents were positive about more wind turbines in Nordland, 41 percent were negative.
The measurement was made in the middle of the conflict over planned wind turbines in Fauske and Sørfold.
Read also
The local fear of wind turbines is due in large part to the wind energy industry
It ended with a massive popular uprising, and a categorical rejection of all wind energy plans in both municipal councils.
Major natural encroachments, uncertainty about the real amount of power and doubts about whether the process could be stopped if municipalities said yes for now were among the reasons.
These are perfectly legitimate objections, but they may also have to do with what is called in English NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard).
For many, windmills seem fine, as long as they don't have to see or handle them.
This is also perhaps one of the reasons why people are more positive about offshore wind than wind energy on land.
Everything indicates that NIMBY will also affect Swedish company Nordic Winds' plans for wind turbines in Skjerstad.
Regardless of whether the city council tells them no on principle or not.
Even Odd Emil Ingebrigtsen from Høyre, who is not at all opposed to wind turbines in principle, told AN that this would be a very long process and that he wanted Norwegian ownership if any new type of energy development was to be carried out in Bodø.
Does this mean that all onshore wind energy plans should be shelved?
This would go too far.
Read also
The Bodø fiasco may mean that we have attacked climate problems in completely the wrong way
There is no doubt that wind energy can solve the problem of energy shortages in some places, but it does not offer any real solution to high electricity prices or lack of energy resources.
The wind is too unstable for that; In some periods the weather is completely calm, and in other periods it blows as if it were just…
The situation is different when it comes to developing wind energy to power concrete projects.
Here too, you rely on a basic source of stable energy, but if there's one thing we have in Nordland, it's just that.
Through wind energy, the use of basic hydropower can be further “extended”, and this wind energy is also short-range, reducing transmission losses.
But if we are to achieve this, new thinking must be done when it comes to the location of new wind power plants.
Placing them in untouched nature away from humans may seem logical from a NIMBY perspective, but that misses the point.
Many of us have such a strong connection to pristine nature and similar areas that it feels more like our garden than our backyard.
The solution is simple. New windmills must be placed where nature is completely destroyed.
Read also
Jonas Jar Sture is about to go from savior of Northern Norway to public enemy of Northern Norway
They can be close to industrial facilities, mines, quarries, commercial areas or roads. There are actually a lot of them to boot.
In countries with less untouched nature, this is indeed the case. In recent years, I have been driving a lot in the Netherlands. There, mills are usually located along the main road.
As they do if you're driving from Gothenburg towards the Norwegian border.
This also means that it should be possible to put windmills in our backyards, literally.
Windmills on the outskirts of Bodø make more sense than removing pristine nature.
It's probably easy for me to say, I think modern windmills are attractive and elegant.
I would have some problems if I had to see some of them from my window.
Others shudder at such a development, I know; Even among those who think old windmills are rustic and beautiful.
But should purely aesthetic considerations be given weight when we talk about the much-needed green transition?
Essential to prevent irreversible climate change and to create new jobs.
The debate over wind energy has long devolved into verbal trench warfare.
Read also
Both sides in the wind energy debate need to show more respect for each other and have a more realistic dialogue
If we want to have a more realistic, fact-based debate, both sides need to come out and complicate the matter.
Because as Bob Dylan also wrote: “How often can a man turn his head and pretend he can't see.”
“Web specialist. Lifelong zombie maven. Coffee ninja. Hipster-friendly analyst.”
