Wind power, regional development and benefit-sharing: The case of Northern Sweden

This paper addresses the question of how investments in wind power can promote regional development and employment, as well as how different benefit-sharing instruments (e.g., community funds etc.) can be used to strengthen the positive impacts. The objectives of the paper are to provide: (a) a survey of previous regional-economic assessments of wind power projects; as well as (b) a quantitative assessment of the employment impacts of an ongoing wind farm investment in the Swedish county of Norrbotten under different benefit-sharing scenarios. Our model-based input-output analysis confirms many of the findings of previous research, such as significant construction work impacts, especially in the presence of local manufacturing. The analysis also illustrates that in the absence of any benefit-sharing mechanism, the employment impacts for Norrbotten during the operating phase will be modest (with an employment multiplier of 1.4). However, even if a relatively low share of the wind power revenues is assumed to accrue to the local government this would have significant positive impacts on employment rates. For this reason, additional research on various types of benefit-sharing instruments is called for, including studies of the associated challenges and trade-offs.