Visibility/invisibility in the 'making' of energy landscape. Strategies and policies in the hydropower development of the Piave river (Italian Eastern Alps)

Abstract This paper discusses the crucial role of visibility and invisibility in socio-spatial acceptability of new renewable energy landscapes. Observing hydropower development in Italian Eastern Alps, we show how visibility and invisibility were purposely used to hide spatial, social and environmental injustices. These strategies, often supported also by environmental and landscape policies, actually limit any possible collaborative 'making' of energy landscapes, which should be based on the transparency of objectives and actions. Among several public policies and private actions, it is possible to identify ten strategies (masking, burying, camouflaging, removing, distracting, staging, digging up, prefiguring, mapping, storytelling) adopted to increase acceptability and prevent conflicts or, on the contrary, to expose the problem, revealing opaque processes and unfair spatial effects. Hiding/showing strategies - and their not directly evident relevant consequences - testify the complexity of the socio-spatial context involved in the process of energy landscape making, which deeply affects social acceptance. This paper sollicits a deeper awareness of the matter of visibility and invisibility in energy policies, which allows to "unveil" what is mendacious and misleading, and drives towards a more sustainable and fairer collaborative making of European landscapes.