STOCKHOLM
\nOffshore wind farms in the Baltic Sea hinder the defense of Sweden and its allies, impairing the military\u2019s ability to identify threats, it said on Wednesday.
\nThe revelation comes after the Swedish government blocked the construction of 13 offshore wind farms in the Baltic on November 4, and stopped another off the island of Gotland on November 21 due to the military\u2019s defense concerns.
\nOn Wednesday the military said all wind farm projects in the Baltic would pose a problem.
\n\u201cThe Swedish Armed Forces have been clear in their evaluation regarding offshore wind energy in the Baltic Sea,\u201d the military said in an email to AFP.
\n\u201cIt would pose unacceptable risks for the defense of our country and our allies,\u201d it added.
\nThe government said the towers and rotating blades of wind turbines emit radar echoes and generate other forms of interference.
\nThe relative proximity of the 13 blocked projects to the \u201chighly militarised\u201d Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, which is sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania, had been \u201ccentral\u201d in the government\u2019s assessment, Defense Minister Pal Jonson said.
\nHe said wind farms in the area could delay the detection of incoming cruise missiles, cutting the warning time in half to 60 seconds.
\n\u201cWe currently see no technical solutions or legal prerequisites for a coexistence of our defense interests and wind power in the Baltic Sea,\u201d the Armed Forces said on Wednesday.
\n\u201cThe greatly deteriorated security situation after Russia\u2019s full-scale invasion of Ukraine means that we can no longer accept any risks to our defense capability.\u201d
\n\u201cOur ability to detect incoming threats against both Sweden and our allies is vital. Our sensor chain plays a decisive role in this and it must be able to operate with the highest possible capability,\u201d it said.
\nTensions have mounted in the Baltic since Russia\u2019s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
\nWith Sweden and Finland now NATO members, all of the countries bordering the Baltic are now members of the alliance except Russia.
\nThe Swedish government has insisted that wind power expansion remained a priority, with electricity consumption expected to double by 2045 from the current level.
\nIt has said other areas off Sweden\u2019s southwestern and northeastern coasts were better suited for offshore wind projects.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
STOCKHOLM Offshore wind farms in the Baltic Sea hinder the defense of Sweden and its allies, impairing the military\u2019s ability to identify threats, it said on Wednesday. The revelation comes after the Swedish government blocked the construction of 13 offshore wind farms in the Baltic on November 4, and stopped another off the island of …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":73438,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73431","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73431","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73431"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73431\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":73450,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73431\/revisions\/73450"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73438"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73431"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73431"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73431"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}