| Summary: | During the coming years, Finland will have to significantly increase its wind energy production in order to meet the targets of the National Climate and Energy Strategy. In principle, wind energy production is environmentally friendly, although it also has some negative environmental impacts, of which the landscape impact is claimed to be the most significant one. In tourist regions, the value of landscape is emphasized. In regions where tourism is primarily based on attractive landscapes, large wind parks are argued to affect tourism negatively. In Finland, especially the tourism activities of Lapland are vulnerable to changes in the natural landscapes. This study examines the effects of wind energy development on tourism in Kemijärvi, where several wind parks are being planned. The aim of this study was to examine, how tourists see the wind energy development in tourism landscape of Kemijärvi and if the wind energy development has any impact on the attractiveness of the area or on the destination choice of tourists. The question is investigated through a survey of domestic travellers in the area, as well as on the basis of a literature review, expert opinions and previous research. The majority of those domestic travellers, who answered the survey, did not feel that the planned wind parks would have any particularly negative effect on their landscape experience. Based on the answers, however, the wind parks could affect negatively the image of the area as a wilderness. On the other hand, the travellers saw that wind energy would, at the same time, enhance the environment-friendly image of the area. In addition, many of the respondents were interested in visiting a wind park. All in all, over 80 % of the travellers answered that the construction of wind parks would not affect their plans to visit the area in the future. In addition, the experts interviewed in this study did not estimate that Kemijärvi wind energy parks would have a particularly negative impact on tourism. In general, siting plays a key role in ...
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