Development and validation of a multicriteria indicator for the assessment of objective aesthetic impact of wind farms

Wind energy represents one of the most important renewable resources. However, despite the fact that wind farms are represented as environmentally friendly projects, they frequently encounter public resistance. One of the main criticisms of wind farm construction projects is directed at their poor aesthetic integration into the landscape. This work develops an indicator to assess the magnitude of the objective aesthetic impact on the landscape caused by the installation of the wind farm. The indicator combines measures of visibility, colour, fractality and continuity which can be taken from photographs. Value functions are constructed for each variable and incorporated into the indicator. This indicator has been used to calculate the objective aesthetic impact of five wind farms. Comparison of the indicator results with a population survey shows that the indicator correctly represents the order of impact as perceived by the population sample, and is thus an appropriate objective measure of aesthetic impact of wind farms.