Impact on Property Values
Your Home is the biggest financial investment most people will make in their lifetime.
You insure it against theft, damage, fire, flood etc.
But you are about to let a handful of people take a huge chunk of its value and line their pockets with it.
Like myself, many locals have asked RWE if their house price will be affected.
To answer that question we must understand what determines a house value, simple answer - Supply and Demand.
If a house is for sale and there are a number of interested parties, the property value will be high.
If 1% are put off the property for any reason (close proximity to Wind turbines in this case) the value will not be as high as the demand has reduced.
If a higher % are put off the property 10, 20, 30, 40, 50%..... now you are in trouble.
What the impact will be is unknown and will vary depending on location.
However rural houses are worst affected as people tend to purchase houses in rural locations because of the pristine landscape and peace and tranquility which will be destroyed if this project proceeds
The following is the response taken from the RWE website in relation to this project:
Yes they are correct there has yet to be a study done in Ireland.
However.....
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Firstly, RWE's link to back them up "see website for further studies here" on their website does not work!
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Secondly, there have yet to be wind turbines of these size constructed in Ireland
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Thirdly, when data is not available in Ireland we look to Europe and neighbouring countries for comparable studies which I have done as they have not bothered and for obvious reason as you will see below.
There have been many studies carried out worldwide showing the negative impact on House prices in close proximity to windfarms ranging from 10 - 60% reduction in value, one of the more highly regarded reports is shown below:
2019 Study by Leibniz Institute for Economic Research, Germany
“ Local Cost for Global Benefit: The Case of Wind Turbines”
extract taken from page 2
“houses in rural areas suffer price reductions of up to
23%,
probably due to stronger preferences for a pristine landscape”
2019 Study by Leibniz Institute for Economic Research, Germany
“ Local Cost for Global Benefit: The Case of Wind Turbines”
Univeristy of Edinburgh Research -
Legal Compensation Frameworks for Wind Farm Disturbance -
Technical Report
Other studies and articles showing negative impact on property prices include:
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/apr/08/windfarms-reduce-house-prices-compensation
1. 2014 Study by the London School of Economics, UK – “Gone with the Wind” extract taken from page 27
“A wind farm ……within 2km reduces prices by some 12% on average, and the implied effect of the visual disamenity is around 15%. …..
However, even at 8-14km there is a 4.5% reduction in prices associated with large visible operational wind farms,”
2. Jensen, C. U., Panduro, T. E., Lundhede, T. H., Nielsen, A. S. E., Dalsgaard, M., & Thorsen, B. J. (2018). The impact of on-shore and off-shore wind turbine farms on property prices. Energy Policy, 116, 50-59.
3. Hoen et al., The Impact of Wind Power Projects on Residential Property Values in the United States: A Multi-Site Hedonic Analysis. United States: N. p., 2009.#
4. Westlund, H., & Wilhelmsson, M. (2021). The socio-economic cost of wind turbines: A Swedish case study. Sustainability, 13(12), 6892
5. Sunak, Y., & Madlener, R. (2016). The impact of wind farm visibility on property values: A spatial difference-in-differences analysis. Energy Economics, 55, 79-91.