Small wind turbines that are intended to cover their own electricity consumption are also a privileged project for the use of wind energy in outdoor areas under building law. This has now been decided by the Rhineland-Palatinate Higher Administrative Court (OVG) in Koblenz (Ref.: 1 A 10247/23 of 17.04.2024), thus confirming the judgement of the lower court.

It could not be inferred from the provision in the Building Code (Section 35 (1) No. 5 BauGB) that only wind turbines serving the public energy supply could be erected in outdoor areas. The OVG also rejected the plaintiff district's objection that privileging such small private wind turbines could lead to „uncontrolled growth“ and thus disfigure the landscape. This was not to be feared, as end users for the electricity generated by such small wind turbines were rather rare in outlying areas and the construction of power lines to feed the electricity into the public grid was ruled out for economic reasons, the OVG argued.

Your contacts for all legal questions relating to renewable energies in our practice are the lawyers  Janko Geßner,  Dr Jan Thiele and Tobias Ross and the lawyers Mareike Thiele, Josefine Wilke and Dr Janett Wölkerling.