Are renewable energy technologies compatible with biodiversity conservation? The energy-conservation legal nexus

The United States and the European Union have launched policy packages aimed at the rapid expansion of renewable energy production. The infrastructural developments underpinning the energy transition amount to the largest infrastructural transformations in nearly a century. At the same time, scientists have documented the many trade-offs that renewable energy facilities pose to nature conservation. This chapter reviews the environmental trade-offs between renewable energy sources and nature conservation and positions these trade-offs at the nexus of energy law and environmental law, each with its own regulatory toolkits and orientations. Then, the US Green New Deal and EU Green Deal are assessed to identify whether and how they seek to overcome or minimize these environmental trade-offs while facilitating the expansion of renewable energy. The assessment shows that, while there are some attempts at minimizing environmental trade-offs, on the whole these two policy packages largely enshrine an ‘energy first’ principle, further exposing nature conservation to risks in order to achieve rapid renewable energy expansion.