The memory of place disruption, senses, and local opposition to Korean wind farms

Abstract

The notion of place is quite useful to account for local acceptance of energy transitions. Using semi-structured interviews and content analysis, this article explores how new places are imagined or formed in opposition to wind farms in South Korea, with a focus on the memory of place disruption and sensory interactions with wind turbines. First, residents opposed to the construction of wind farms imagine negative places in opposition to future energy transitions, such as places in which landslides and ecological disruptions have occurred, based on trauma from past place disruption. Second, residents' sensory experiences of the noise created by wind turbines and the turbines' aviation-obstruction lights form concepts of artificial, urban, or mechanical places in opposition to the natural or rural quality of the places prior to wind turbine construction. These negative places that are formed based on memory and sensory input drive opposition to wind turbines. Therefore, place-people relations should be adequately and carefully discussed in both site-planning and community engagement processes associated with wind farms.