Switzerland: Risks associated with implementing a national energy strategy

Abstract

Overall, the Swiss prefer domestic production of renewable electricity, but a majority share of imported renewable electricity will likely be cheaper overall and cause fewer issues with intermittency. However, the renewable imports pathway would face more problems with acceptance of new infrastructure, especially long-distance transmission lines. The most recommended option would be to combine the domestic renewable pathway with the imported renewable pathway. The most favourable combination seems to be Swiss rooftop PV, offshore wind from the North Sea, and Swiss hydropower. Such a mix would also be acceptable to the Swiss public. This is especially important, given the Swiss political system in which policies and projects can be challenged in local, cantonal and national referenda. However, depending on the demand for renewables in EU countries, this may require expansion of transmission capacity in the Dutch / Belgian / Danish and German grids. Both the needs for grid expansion, and ways that this could be done in a manner acceptable to residents around the new transmission lines, should be researched further. This narrative has two major implications for the Swiss energy strategy. First, the ES2050 can be broadened to include imports of wind and/or CSP, but Swiss ownership and operational control would be preferable to the Swiss people. Second, as long as there is no forum to resolve the diverging interpretations of ES 2050 amongst local, cantonal and national stakeholders, we can expect conflicts and delays. The risks we examined were of a political, technical and economic nature. The political risks were mostly barriers to implementing one of the pathways, and the technical and economic risks were mostly about the consequences of these pathways. This follows a pattern we have observed in general in the literature about the Swiss energy transition. The most pressing risk seems to be delay or outright failure to obtain permits, and more generally, how to plan and build energy infrastructure without provoking opposition and legal challenges from nearby residents. This has been done successfully in Switzerland, for example for the Linth-Limmern pumped storage plant and its connection to the grid, where residents raised no objections. It would be worthwhile to investigating successful processes for energy infrastructure and determine how these can be mainstreamed.