台灣發展社區公民風場的優勢和潛力

Profit and Potential for Community Wind Farms in Taiwan

台灣作為一個經濟中心，是亞太地區中具備最堅實科技製造基地之一。台灣有很高的能源需求，惟缺乏自然資源，97％的能源依賴進口。透過將風力發電納入能源多元化，尤其是台灣沿岸的陸域和海上風場，將為台灣帶來更高的能源自足性，同時確保能源安全。風力發電為台灣人民提供了支持和利用再生能源發電獲利的機會，卻不因此產生健康折損的疑慮。多年來，在歐洲有許多社區居民投資的風場已經取得了極大成功。在地的風能合作社或其他參與式商業模式，佔歐洲風電總體發展的絕大部分。在丹麥和德國，超過一半的再生能源是由社區投資的。歐洲的經驗證明，居民參與投資社區風場能有效提高對於風力發電的接受度。本文探討了再生能源合作社和社區共享所有權的投資模型，並提供歐洲三個成功的社區投資風電項目。本文同時建議如何讓社區投資再生能源模式在台灣推動實行。台灣在取得融資，風機技術，設備維護廠商和相關項目執行資源等十分便利，但卻很難找到經驗豐富、有能力進行規劃和取得許可證照的風電開發商。政府可採取相關措施，包括為社區投資項目提供更高的躉售電價，保證電網串接，簡化申請流程，並分配更多空間給風電開發項目，以有效促進社區風場的發展。最後，社區風場真正能成功的關鍵是「能被信任的人」：這個被社區居民所信任的人同時需具有財務和商業背景，了解如何發起和運營社區投資的合作社。

Taiwan is an economic hub with one of the strongest tech manufacturing bases in Asia Pacific. It has high energy needs but scarce natural resources; 97% of energy is imported. Diversification into wind energy, especially in on-shore and off-shore wind farms along the coast of Taiwan, would result in higher self-sufficiency and energy security. Wind energy is well positioned to give Taiwan's people a chance to support and profit from renewable energy and electricity generation that does not come at a cost to their health. Community-invested windfarms in Europe have been around for many years and with great success. Local wind cooperatives or other participatory business models have been responsible for a large share of total wind development; in both Denmark and Germany over half of renewables are community-invested. The experience in Europe shows that participation of residents in community windfarms leads to better acceptance of the windfarms. This article explores cooperative and community-shared ownership models for community investment and describes three successful communityinvested wind projects in Europe. The article provides suggestions on how the community-invested model can be made to work in Taiwan. Financing, wind-turbine technology, maintenance companies and project execution resources are widely available in Taiwan. Experienced wind project developers capable of carrying out initial planning and permitting are harder to find. The government could take steps to better enable the development of community-based wind projects by making available a higher feed-in tariff for community-invested projects, guaranteeing grid connection, simplifying the application process, and allocating more land for wind project development. The key to a successful project however is a “trusted person:” a person trusted by the community who has the financial and business background to start up and run the community-invested cooperative.