Assessment of the theoretical potential of onshore wind power plants in Poland in the context of the required distance from residential buildings

• Poland has a significant onshore wind energy potential. • The theoretical potential of onshore wind energy can reach even 223.5 GW. • Theoretical potential of wind power plants is a derivative of the legal framework. • Required distance between turbines and dwellings affects the wind energy potential. The study aims to assess how the theoretical potential of wind power plants in Poland changes depending on the mandatory distance from residential buildings. The distance that must be maintained between wind turbines and residential buildings is often the subject matter of the dispute. In this study, the theoretical potential is considered from three aspects: accessible land, installed capacity, and electricity production. For the evaluation of the latter two, the reference turbine model was adopted. The study was performed using geospatial analysis and is based mainly on topographic objects database. The outcome of this paper confirms that the available area for wind energy development and, consequently, their theoretical potential are strongly dependent on the required distance from residential buildings. Nonetheless, with the assumed boundary conditions, it seems that even with the 1,200 m and 1,000 m legal distance, there is a wide accessible area in Poland for the wind power plants development. The result of the performed analysis demonstrates that wind energy can satisfy a large part of the electricity demand in Poland. The theoretical potential in terms of installed capacity is also significant and, for instance, reaches 43.04 GW for the required distance of 1,000 m.