Offshore wind farms in Southern Europe – Determining tourist preference and social acceptance

Abstract There is increasing consensus that resistance to the siting of wind power facilities cannot be explained by the NIMBY phenomenon alone or other localized environmental impacts. This deficiency is addressed by examining the determinants of tourist preferences for positioning of wind farms in the Mediterranean Sea. A principal component analysis is used to identify general attitudinal themes that act as covariates in a choice model. We demonstrate that the welfare economic impacts associated with spending holidays in the vicinity of an offshore wind farm do not merely depend on visibility effects, but equally on the individual's opinion of climate change, efficiency of wind energy and the substitutability of nuclear and fossil fuels with renewable power generating sources.