If we make the right choices now, we can deploy the energy transition to make the Netherlands richer, more cohesive and cleaner. That was the message advanced by the Board of Government Advisers, of which Berno Strootman was a member until 1 January 2021, in ‘Via Paris, a design exploration towards a climate-neutral Netherlands’.
Principal
College van Rijksadviseurs
Partners
Studio Marco Vermeulen
Design Year
2019
The Board recommends that when measures are being chosen, it is not enough to consider only the reduction of CO2 emissions, but those measures should be adopted that in the long term and on the basis of integrally well-considered choices can make a maximal contribution to the quality of the environment.
The energy transition has major consequences for our cities and landscapes. The Netherlands is going to make room for the generation of sustainable energy and the construction of new networks for heat and electricity. For that to run efficiently and effectively, the Board considers it important that there is an inspiring spatial vision that shows what the Netherlands can look like in a few decades from now.
That is why the Board commissioned a design exploration of a climate-neutral Netherlands in 2050 from Studio Marco Vermeulen. The Via Paris project links the energy transition with other challenges, such as agricultural sustainability, housing and the existing qualities of the country.
The Board recommends putting the emphasis on advantages of scale, for example opting for public heat networks instead of individual heat pumps in areas that lend themselves for that. The Board also recommends the drawing up of an integral plan for the North Sea with the most emphasis on the production of wind energy at sea. The North Sea can provide the Netherlands with around 80% of the total demand for electricity, i.e. half of the total energy requirement of the Netherlands, in 2050.
On land the recommendation is to generate wind energy in a concentrated way in a number of large wind parks in large-scale, rational landscapes. The generation of solar energy can be done by means of large-scale solar energy stations on water, docklands and industrial estates as well as beside a number of motorways. The generation of solar energy on roofs and outside walls should be given maximal encouragement. This will make it possible to avoid solar energy stations on agricultural land and in areas of natural beauty.