Reconciling landscape protection and renewable energy in Italy: an updated analysis in light of recent developments.

Purpose and scope 

Can the promotion of renewable energy and the protection of landscape heritage truly coexist, or does one inevitably prevail over the other? And if a balance is possible, how is it being reshaped in contemporary European and Italian public law?

This article revisits and expands upon my undergraduate thesis, “Promuovere le energie rinnovabili e tutelare il paesaggio: missione impossibile?” (Università di Pisa, A.A. 2023–2024). In that earlier work, I argued that Italian public law was progressively moving beyond the paradigm of “parallel safeguarding” (tutele parallele), a model in which environmental and landscape protections operated along distinct, and often conflicting, tracks. In its place, an integrated framework grounded in proportionality was beginning to emerge. This shift was most clearly articulated by the Sixth Chamber of the Council of State in judgment No. 8167/2022, which rejected “totalising” applications of heritage and landscape constraints and instead anchored administrative decision-making in proportionality and the principle of integration (Article 11 TFEU; Article 3-quarter of the Italian Environmental Code). In doing so, the court anticipated a broader legal transformation that has since been consolidated at both the EU and national levels. Building on that foundation, the present update asks: to what extent have recent legislative and regulatory developments confirmed, or altered, this trajectory?

Methodologically, the article integrates primary legal sources with European Commission guidance and regulatory monitoring practices. It then assesses the implications of this evolving framework for the Italian legal system and, by extension, explores its potential significance for the European Union as a whole.

The EU layer: RED III, acceleration areas and overriding public interest

The Renewable Energy Directive (EU) 2023/2413 (RED III) represents a decisive regulatory shift in the European Union’s approach to the deployment of renewable energy, not only by raising the 2030 binding target to at least 42.5%, with an additional indicative top-up to 45%, but, more significantly, by operationalising a comprehensive framework for acceleration grounded in legal certainty, procedural simplification and spatial planning integration. At the core of this framework lies the introduction of Renewables Acceleration Areas (RAAs), coupled with harmonised maximum permitting deadlines, the promotion of digitalised administrative procedures, and the explicit qualification of renewable energy projects, related grid infrastructure, and storage facilities as projects of overriding public interest (OPI), «until climate neutrality is achieved».

This qualification, enshrined in Article 16f of Directive (EU) 2018/2001 as amended by RED III, has profound legal implications. It aligns renewable energy deployment with the derogation regimes provided under Article 6(4) of Habitats Directive and Article 9 of Birds Directive, thereby allowing, under strict conditions, the authorisation of projects even in the presence of adverse environmental impacts, provided that no feasible alternatives exist and adequate compensatory measures are adopted. This provision effectively strengthens the legal weight of renewable energy projects in the balancing of competing public interests, without formally establishing a rigid hierarchy among constitutional or environmental values.

The operationalisation of RAAs is primarily governed by Articles 15c–15e of the revised directive. Within these designated areas, identified through prior strategic environmental assessment (SEA), Member States are required to ensure significantly streamlined permitting procedures. In particular, projects located within RAAs are subject to a screening procedure to determine whether a full environmental impact assessment (EIA) is necessary. Where the screening concludes that significant adverse effects are unlikely, the project may proceed without a project-specific EIA, without prejudice to compliance with the Water Framework Directive and the aforementioned nature protection directives. This mechanism reflects a clear policy choice: shifting the environmental assessment upstream to the planning phase, thereby reducing duplication and delays at the project approval stage.

Recent EU monitoring confirms the challenges of this transition. A 2025 joint analysis by WWF, Oeko Institut, CAN Europe, BirdLife Europe and EEB shows that although mapping processes have begun across nearly all Member States, substantial barriers persist, including uneven datasets, limited administrative staffing and fragmented governance structures. Moreover, many Member States are unlikely to meet the 21 February 2026 deadline for formally designating RAAs, due to persistent data gaps and coordination difficulties.

The European Commission has further clarified and consolidated this regulatory architecture through its Communication of May 2024 on the designation of acceleration areas, which provides detailed guidance on mapping methodologies, data requirements and governance structures. The guidance emphasises the need for high-resolution geospatial datasets, including biodiversity sensitivity layers, landscape and cultural heritage constraints and grid capacity indicators. Crucially, it introduces the requirement for a “mitigation rulebook” to accompany each RAA designation plan, specifying ex ante the environmental safeguards and design standards applicable to projects within the area. This approach aims to ensure that environmental and landscape considerations are systematically embedded in the zoning process, rather than addressed on a case-by-case basis. Complementing this, the Commission Recommendation (EU) 2024/1343 on accelerating permitting procedures outlines a set of best practices for Member States, including the establishment of digital one-stop shops, the standardisation of application requirements, early stakeholder engagement and the strengthening of administrative capacity. The Recommendation, while non-binding, reflects a coordinated effort to address the structural bottlenecks identified across Member States, particularly in relation to administrative fragmentation and resource constraints.

Temporal discipline constitutes another pillar of the RED III framework. Article 16 establishes maximum deadlines for permitting procedures, generally set at 12 months for projects in RAAs and 24 months outside such areas, with shorter timelines for repowering and small-scale installations. These deadlines are coupled with procedural safeguards, including the principle of tacit consent (silenzio assenso) in specific contexts, which has been progressively incorporated into national legal systems, including Italy. While the formal transposition deadline for most RED III provisions was set for 21 May 2025, the directive also imposes immediate obligations regarding the identification of suitable areas and the gradual designation of RAAs. In practice, Member States have been encouraged to advance mapping exercises and preparatory planning activities by early 2026, through both legislative and soft-law instruments, to ensure timely compliance and to align national permitting systems with the new EU framework. This anticipatory approach is particularly relevant in jurisdictions such as Italy, where the identification of suitable areas under Legislative Decree No. 199/2021 is still in progress and constitutes a critical prerequisite for the effective implementation of RAAs.

Empirical monitoring and sectoral analyses confirm that several Member States are already adapting their administrative systems in line with RED III requirements. Common trends include the consolidation of single contact points for project developers, the digitalisation of permitting workflows, the introduction of expedited procedures for repowering projects, and the expansion of simplified regimes for small photovoltaic installations. These measures collectively contribute to enhancing predictability and reducing regulatory risk, which are essential conditions for mobilising private investment in the renewable energy sector. The broader implication of this regulatory evolution is its functional reconfiguration within a more integrated planning paradigm: by embedding environmental and cultural landscape considerations into the designation of RAAs, the EU framework seeks to reconcile the objectives of decarbonisation and territorial protection through anticipatory governance. In this sense, landscape protection is not abandoned but re-sequenced, since it is addressed primarily at the strategic planning level, thereby limiting the scope for discretionary and potentially inconsistent interventions at the permitting stage. This approach is consistent with the principles of integration and proportionality that underpin EU environmental law and resonates with the jurisprudential orientation of the Italian Council of State, particularly in its judgment No. 8167/2022, which emphasised the need for a balanced and context-sensitive evaluation of competing public interests. The RED III framework, however, goes a step further by structurally embedding this balance within the planning process itself, thereby reducing reliance on ex post judicial or administrative arbitration.

Italy’s reform cycle: the Testo Unico Rinnovabili, suitable areas and the 2025 corrective

Italy has implemented Directive (EU) 2023/2413 through a far-reaching restructuring of its domestic regulatory framework, centred on the adoption of Legislative Decree No. 190 of 2024 (Testo Unico Rinnovabili, hereinafter “TUR”). This decree, published in the Gazzetta Ufficiale on 12 December 2024 and entered into force on 30 December 2024, systematises and consolidates the previously fragmented authorization regimes into a tripartite structure composed by free building activity (edilizia libera), simplified authorisation procedure (procedura abilitativa semplificata – PAS) and single authorisation (autorizzazione unica), while introducing a fully digitalised permitting architecture. In line with Article 16f of Directive (EU) 2018/2001 as amended by RED III, the TUR explicitly qualifies renewable energy plants, storage systems, and related grid infrastructure as works of «public utility, indispensable and urgent», thereby incorporating the EU‑level presumption of overriding public interest.

This normative qualification is not merely declaratory, because it operates as a rebuttable but reinforced presumption that reshapes administrative discretion, requiring competent authorities, particularly those responsible for landscape and cultural heritage protection, to provide a heightened and specific justification when opposing renewable energy projects. In doing so, the TUR reduces the scope for generic or abstract objections at the late stages of the permitting process and aligns Italian administrative practice with the EU’s proportionality-driven balancing model. The decree also introduces binding procedural timelines, strengthens the principle of tacit consent in defined cases (particularly where competent authorities fail to issue timely and duly reasoned objections within the statutory deadlines), and mandates the use of interoperable digital platforms for the submission and management of applications, thereby addressing long-standing inefficiencies identified in both national and EU-level assessments.

The second structural pillar of the Italian reform is represented by the Ministerial Decree of 21 June 2024 on the identification of suitable areas (aree idonee), adopted by the Ministry of Environment and Energy Security in agreement with the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Agriculture, Food Sovereignty and Forestry. Published in the Gazzetta Ufficiale No. 153 of 2 July 2024, the decree establishes uniform national criteria for spatial planning, introduces a georeferenced digital platform for mapping, and allocates regional targets within the broader objective of achieving approximately 80 GW of additional renewable capacity by 2030 compared to 2020 levels. The decree requires regions and autonomous provinces, within 180 days of its entry into force, to classify their territories into three categories: suitable areas (subject to accelerated procedures), non-suitable areas (where installations are excluded or severely restricted), and ordinary areas (subject to standard permitting). This zoning exercise must be conducted through participatory processes involving local authorities and must be supported by strategic environmental assessment (SEA) and, where relevant, appropriate assessment under the Habitats Directive.

A critical innovation concerns the recalibration of the role of landscape authorities. Within suitable areas, the opinion of the competent Soprintendenza remains mandatory but is no longer binding and must be expressed within shortened procedural deadlines. This aligns with RED III’s upstream planning model, where landscape and cultural sensitivities are internalised during the designation phase. The ministerial decree is complemented by technical documentation and datasets made available through the Gestore dei Servizi Energetici (GSE), ensuring transparency and uniformity in the application of criteria across the national territory. The reform trajectory has been further consolidated by Legislative Decree No. 178 of 2025, published in the Gazzetta Ufficiale No. 275 of 26 November 2025 and republished with annotations in No. 287 of 11 December 2025. This corrective decree strengthens the operational dimension of the TUR by activating the Sportello Unico per le Energie Rinnovabili (SUER), a national digital one-stop shop designed to centralise and streamline permitting procedures. It also expands the scope of PAS to additional categories of projects, introduces mechanisms of substitute power by the State in cases of regional inertia in the designation of suitable areas, and, in specific cases where projects fully comply with the planning framework of suitable areas, provides for the absorption or waiver of a separate landscape authorisation. Such derogations, however, remain subject to compliance with EU environmental law, including the Birds Directive and the Water Framework Directive, as well as to the protection regimes applicable to assets of exceptional cultural value under the Cultural Heritage and Landscape Code (Codice dei beni culturali e del paesaggio).

The combined effect of these reforms is a paradigmatic shift in the Italian regulatory model. The evaluation of environmental and landscape constraints is now largely front-loaded into the planning and mapping phase, supported by SEA, appropriate assessment, and structured public participation. This largely replaces the previous system, characterised by fragmented and often inconsistent case-by-case assessments, with a plan-led presumption of compatibility. Accordingly, where a project is located within a duly designated suitable area and complies with the relevant planning instruments, any refusal must satisfy a stringent proportionality test, grounded in concrete and site-specific risks, such as impacts on Natura 2000 sites or on protected cultural assets, rather than on generalised or purely aesthetic considerations.

Jurisprudential continuity: Council of State 8167/2022 as the bridge

The judgment No. 8167/2022 of Sixth Chamber of the Council of State, represents a pivotal jurisprudential moment in the evolution of the Italian legal framework governing the relationship between renewable energy development and landscape protection. In that case, the Court annulled a series of ministerial measures that, subsequent to the issuance of valid authorisations, sought to impose extensive “indirect” cultural constraints (vincoli indiretti) around a system of devotional crosses in the Molise region, with the practical effect of precluding the implementation of authorised wind energy projects. The Court’s reasoning is particularly significant for its reaffirmation of a fundamental constitutional principle: no protected interest, whether relating to cultural heritage under Article 9 of the Constitution or to environmental protection, enjoys absolute or hierarchical primacy. Rather, the relationship between such values must be governed by a dynamic and context-sensitive process of balancing, grounded in the principles of proportionality, reasonableness, and integration. In this respect, the judgment aligns with the broader trajectory of Italian constitutional jurisprudence, which has consistently rejected rigid hierarchies among fundamental values in favour of a model based on concrete balance. 

The doctrinal reception of decision No. 8167/2022 has been substantial: legal scholarship has characterised the ruling as marking the emergence of a “new compositional axiology”, particularly in light of the constitutional reform introduced by Constitutional Law No. 1 of 11 February 2022, which amended Articles 9 and 41 of the Constitution by explicitly incorporating environmental protection, biodiversity, and the interests of future generations into the catalogue of fundamental principles. Within this renewed constitutional framework, the promotion of renewable energy assumes a structurally reinforced position, not as an overriding value in abstracto, but as a central component of the broader objective of sustainable development. The subsequent legislative developments examined above (namely, the TUR, the Ministerial Decree of 21 June 2024 and Legislative Decree No. 178/2025) can be interpreted as a normative crystallisation of the principles articulated in the 2022 judgment. These instruments operationalise, at both EU and national levels, the presumption of overriding public interest (OPI) for renewable energy projects, introduce a plan-led approach to spatial allocation, recalibrate the role of landscape authorities through non-binding opinions within designated areas, and impose digitalised, time-bound administrative procedures. In this sense, the Italian regulatory framework has moved from a reactive, case-by-case model, often characterised by ex post interventions and conflicting administrative positions, to a proactive system in which the balancing of interests is largely anticipated and structured at the planning stage. 

As might be expected, the transformation of the regulatory model has direct consequences for the scope and intensity of judicial review. Courts are likely to shift their focus away from the substantive merits of individual permitting decisions, particularly where these are consistent with duly adopted planning instruments, and toward the scrutiny of the quality and legality of the upstream planning process. This includes, inter alia, the adequacy and transparency of the datasets used for the designation of suitable areas and renewables acceleration areas, the robustness of strategic environmental assessment (SEA) and appropriate assessment under the Habitats Directive, the coherence and enforceability of mitigation measures embedded in planning instruments, and the effectiveness of public participation procedures as required by both EU law and the Aarhus Convention. Within this evolving framework, the role of the administrative judiciary, consistent with the approach adopted in decision No. 8167/2022, will increasingly be to identify and correct outliers, namely cases where administrative action departs from the principles of proportionality, transparency, or procedural fairness, rather than to reopen or substitute policy choices that have been lawfully and coherently made at the planning level.

 Mapping well or mapping poorly: why the details of “suitable areas” matter

The European Commission’s 2024 guidance on the designation of renewables acceleration areas (RAAs) provides a detailed and prescriptive methodological framework, leaving limited discretion to Member States as to the evidentiary standards required for spatial planning. In particular, the guidance requires that the identification of RAAs be grounded in robust, up-to-date, and georeferenced spatial datasets, encompassing biodiversity sensitivity (including Natura 2000 sites and ecological corridors), landscape and cultural heritage constraints, land-use patterns, and, crucially, existing and planned grid infrastructure capacity. This data-driven approach is intended to ensure that the designation of acceleration areas is not merely formal but substantively capable of supporting rapid and legally resilient permitting. 

A central innovation introduced by the Commission is the requirement that each RAA be accompanied by a detailed “mitigation rulebook”, specifying ex ante the technical and operational measures necessary to avoid or significantly reduce environmental and landscape impacts, such as the avoidance of key avian migratory routes and bat habitats, the use of micro-siting techniques, buffer zones around culturally sensitive areas, temporal modulation of construction, and adaptive curtailment systems for wind turbines. Beyond EU minimum requirements, stakeholder organisations such as the Renewables Grid Initiative have emphasised the need to align RAA designation with forward-looking grid development. This reflects concerns, also consistent with the logic of the TEN-E Regulation, that insufficient coordination may create geographically “isolated” renewable generation clusters lacking adequate transmission capacity, thereby displacing conflicts to later infrastructure expansion phases. The European best‑practice framework for such rulebooks has been consolidated in the 2025 Renewable Energy Coordination Group’s Operational Blueprint, developed with The Nature Conservancy. This Blueprint outlines methodologies for low‑conflict zoning, technical mitigation standards and grid‑integration analyses aligning with RED III requirements.

The Italian implementation through the Ministerial Decree of 21 June 2024 reflects these European requirements while introducing a territorially differentiated governance model. The decree allocates the national target of approximately 80 GW of additional renewable capacity by 2030 and requires regions and autonomous provinces to identify suitable (aree idonee), non-suitable, and ordinary areas through binding legislative or administrative acts. While the decree formally established a 180-day deadline from its entry into force, the state of implementation as of early 2026 reveals a fragmented and incomplete mapping process. 

Official monitoring by national institutions, including the Gestore dei Servizi Energetici and the Ministry of Environment and Energy Security, indicates that only a limited number of regions have adopted comprehensive and legally robust mapping instruments. These are typically regions that had pre-existing spatial planning frameworks for renewables (e.g. building on earlier regional energy-environmental plans), allowing faster alignment with the new decree. Several regions have adopted preliminary or partial measures, often consisting of draft laws or guidelines, interim identification criteria, or provisional GIS layers not yet legally binding. A significant group of regions remains in delay, with no formally adopted mapping acts or with procedures still at the consultation or strategic environmental assessment (SEA) stage.

A key structural issue concerns the heterogeneity of datasets and methodologies used at regional level. Although the decree requires the use of the national digital platform under Article 21 of Legislative Decree No. 199/2021, full interoperability has not yet been achieved. In practice, consistent with the dataset standards described above, there is an asymmetry which is particularly problematic given that grid availability is a decisive factor for the effective viability of designated suitable areas. Another critical dimension concerns the legal quality of regional zoning acts. Early evidence shows that some regional measures rely on broad exclusion buffers (e.g. large uniform setbacks from protected areas or cultural sites) or generic landscape classifications, which risk being challenged for lack of proportionality or insufficient differentiation. This raises the likelihood that litigation will shift upstream, from project-level permitting decisions to the legality of the mapping instruments themselves, particularly where stakeholders contest the adequacy of SEA procedures, the completeness and updating of biodiversity datasets or the justification of zoning choices in light of the overriding public interest in renewables. At the same time, there are positive developments in administrative digitalisation. The progressive deployment of interoperable platforms, coordinated with national systems and increasingly integrated with regional GIS portals, has begun to improve transparency, traceability, and access to spatial data. However, these tools are not yet uniformly operational across all regions, limiting their systemic impact.

These divergences were further highlighted following the introduction of GSE’s Suitable Areas Platform (Piattaforma Aree Idonee -PAI) and its Acceleration Zones Map in 2025, which revealed substantial inconsistencies in regional classification criteria and geospatial input layers. Moreover, a recent TAR ruling has required clearer and more harmonized criteria for designating suitable areas, prompting renewed dialogue between State and regional administrations.

Overall, the Italian framework remains normatively advanced but operationally uneven. The effectiveness of the mapping exercise depends less on formal compliance with the decree than on:

• the technical robustness of spatial datasets,
• the integration of grid and generation planning,
• the procedural quality of regional decision-making, including meaningful public participation.

Where these conditions are met, suitable area designation can function as intended under RED III, transforming downstream permitting into a largely standardised compliance exercise. Where they are not, the system risks reproducing the very uncertainty and delays it seeks to eliminate, with spatial planning itself becoming the primary locus of administrative and judicial contestation.

From permitting to planning: recalibrating the balance

Building upon the regulatory and jurisprudential transformations outlined above, the effectiveness of the acceleration paradigm must be assessed within its broader systemic context, namely the interaction between permitting frameworks, electricity market design, grid infrastructure, and strategic planning under the National Energy and Climate Plans (NECPs). In this respect, recent empirical evidence confirms that acceleration cannot be reduced to procedural streamlining but requires structural alignment with the operational realities of the energy system. The 2025 Market Monitoring Reports of the Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators emphasise that the European electricity market is increasingly shaped by variability linked to renewable generation profiles, with corresponding implications for price formation, balancing needs and investment signals. In particular, the reports identify persistent gaps in forward market liquidity and delays in the realisation of interconnection capacity, both of which risk undermining the bankability of renewable and storage projects if not addressed through coordinated planning. 

Within this framework, the Italian planning instruments examined above, especially the spatial designation of suitable areas, acquire a function that goes beyond administrative simplification. Their effectiveness depends on their capacity to internalise grid-related constraints and opportunities, thereby aligning siting decisions with network topology and future reinforcement plans. This requirement is explicitly reflected in Italy’s updated Integrated National Energy and Climate Plan (NECP), adopted on 1 July 2024 pursuant to Governance Regulation, which underscores the need to synchronise renewable deployment with investments in transmission, distribution, and system flexibility. 

The European Commission’s assessment of the Italian plan, as articulated in Recommendation (EU) 2024/599 and further elaborated in the 2025 Staff Working Document, highlights that while progress has been made, structural challenges remain in ensuring adequate grid integration and flexibility resources to accommodate the projected increase in renewable capacity. In this sense, the presumption in favour of renewable energy projects, already embedded at both EU and national levels, finds additional justification in macro-systemic considerations. 

Spatial planning that prioritises proximity to existing substations, industrial demand centres, and planned grid corridors can significantly reduce curtailment risks and limit the need for additional transmission infrastructure. Conversely, the designation of suitable areas without adequate regard to grid connectivity risks displacing conflicts from generation assets to network expansion, thereby reintroducing landscape and territorial disputes in a different regulatory phase. Against this systemic backdrop, the practical recalibration of the balance between landscape protection and renewable energy deployment, already anticipated in the legislative and planning instruments discussed, becomes more clearly defined. First, the re-sequencing of the balancing test is reinforced by its integration into a multi-level planning architecture. 

Where spatial designation has been carried out in compliance with national criteria and supported by adequate environmental assessments, the compatibility of renewable projects is presumed within those areas. Administrative opposition, therefore, must now be grounded in precise and evidence-based considerations, consistent with EU environmental obligations such as those arising under the Habitats Directive, rather than in generalised references to landscape impact. This confirms the transition from discretionary, case-by-case evaluation toward a structured and anticipatory model of decision-making. Second, participatory governance acquires a systemic function in ensuring the legitimacy and durability of planning choices. 

By concentrating stakeholder engagement at the stage where spatial trade-offs are defined, the framework reduces the likelihood of conflict at the permitting stage and enhances the evidentiary robustness of administrative decisions. This approach is consistent with the requirements of the Aarhus Convention, which emphasises early and effective public participation in environmental decision-making. Third, landscape protection is operationalised as a parameter of system-efficient siting. The identification of suitable areas is no longer guided solely by the minimisation of visual or cultural impacts, but also by the optimisation of energy flows, infrastructure efficiency and land-use compatibility. This systemic dimension is reinforced by the European Commission’s 2025 European Grids Package, which identifies grid congestion, slow interconnection permitting and insufficient hosting capacity as structural risks for renewable deployment. It proposes revisions to TEN-E and accelerated grid permitting processes to ensure adequate transmission infrastructure accompanies spatial planning for renewables. Comparative analysis reinforces this trend. Research on Lithuania’s implementation of RED III shows that while the Directive does not harmonize national planning systems, it significantly strengthens territorial steering by linking zoning decisions to authorization outcomes.

In continuity with the previous sections the coherence between spatial planning, environmental assessment and energy system needs, which leads the permitting phase to be reduced to a verification of conformity with predefined parameters. 

Conclusion: consolidation, open issues, and research agenda

This update confirms the central intuition of my bachelor’s thesis: the promotion of renewable energy and the protection of landscape are not mutually exclusive, provided that the legal system abandons parallel safeguards and embraces integration, proportionality, and plan-led administration. The EU–Italy tandem now embeds this approach in positive law through RED III’s framework of renewables acceleration areas (RAAs) and overriding public interest (OPI), as well as Italy’s Testo Unico Rinnovabili, suitable areas and the SUER. Within this model, landscape protection is neither marginalised nor absolutized; rather, it is internalised ex ante through spatial planning, mitigation rulebooks, and structured environmental assessment, while core environmental safeguards remain intact. At the same time, the effectiveness and legitimacy of this integrated framework depend on a set of unresolved issues that define a clear research and policy agenda. 

First, the quality and legal defensibility of spatial mapping emerge as decisive: courts will increasingly scrutinise collision risk models, cumulative visual impact assessments, viewshed analyses for culturally significant sites, and the rationale linking siting decisions to grid constraints. Weak or incomplete evidentiary bases risk shifting litigation upstream and fragmenting the system anew. Then, the evolving balance between State and regional competences, particularly in light of the 2025 corrective decree and the expansion of substitution powers, requires careful calibration to avoid constitutional tensions while preserving sensitivity to diverse cultural landscapes. In addition to that, the alignment between generation planning and grid development remains critical: as highlighted by sectoral analyses, acceleration in plant permitting without corresponding network expansion may displace conflicts rather than resolve them, underscoring the need to integrate RAA and aree idonee mapping with TEN-E priorities and NECP grid strategies. A further systemic risk concerns the mismatch between renewable rollout and cross‑border grid expansion. The 2025 European Grids Package warns that insufficient transmission capacity may shift territorial disputes from renewable plants to new grid corridors if planning processes are not synchronised.

Ultimately, the challenge ahead is not one of principle but of implementation quality. The durability of the new legal settlement will depend on the coherence, transparency and empirical robustness of planning choices, as well as on the capacity of institutions to maintain a balance that is both efficient and equitable. 

His conclusion is further corroborated by recent institutional audit evidence. The European Court of Auditors, in its Special Report No. 10/2026, highlights that the effectiveness of the EU’s renewable energy transition continues to be constrained not primarily by the absence of regulatory frameworks, but by persistent structural and implementation deficiencies at both Union and Member State level. In particular, the report identifies legal uncertainty, administrative fragmentation, and insufficient coordination between regulatory layers as key obstacles undermining the practical deployment of renewable energy initiatives, including citizen-led and decentralised models. It also emphasises the continued existence of infrastructural bottlenecks, especially in relation to grid access and integration, as well as the lack of adequate incentives for system flexibility and storage solutions. 

These findings reinforce the central claim advanced in this article: that the success of the emerging plan-led model depends less on the formal adoption of acceleration mechanisms, such as renewables acceleration areas and overriding public interest clauses, than on the administrative, technical and governance capacity to operationalise them coherently. In this sense, the current phase of the energy transition can be understood not as a problem of legal design, but as one of institutional performance.