German Federal State North-Rhine Westphalia, with 18 million inhabitants, is blocking the use of additional 40% land for deploying wind energy. The 1,000 meter distance rule slows down the expansion of wind energy considerably: A study by the State Office for Nature, Environment and Consumer Protection NRW (LANUV) has shown that 42 percent more space would be available for wind turbines in NRW in one fell swoop if the distance from thousand meters would be reduced to 720 meters. At first glance, the abolition of the minimum distance is a politically rewarding project: great effect (plus 42 percent area) for manageable effort (delete one paragraph). But the conservative CDU and liberal FDP introduced them out of conviction and stuck to them - in order to create more acceptance for wind turbines among the population, as they emphasized at the time And the greens? After the state elections in 2022, they simply could not get their way in the coalition negotiations with the conservative CDU with their desire to quickly scrap the one-thousand-meter rule. The compromise provides for them to be phased out gradually - over several years, at the earliest in mid-2024. https://www1.wdr.de/nachrichten/landespolitik/windraeder-gruene-gegen-abschaffung-tausend-meter-100.html