Student hackathon on Latvia's largest wind farm site left out local residents
A Riga Technical University institute held a student hackathon on the future of the Saka parish, but neither residents nor the local municipality were informed, and most students had never visited the area. The article's author says materials used at the event were closely tied to the developer behind a contested wind farm project.
Riga Technical University's Institute of Environmental Protection and Heating Systems recently held a student hackathon titled "Saki, ko darīt ar Saku?" ("Speak up, what to do with Saka?"), focused on development ideas for the Saka parish in the Dienvidkurzeme municipality. Laila Šildere, chair of the Saka parish residents' council, attended the event and writes that neither the local community nor the municipal government had been informed about it in advance.
Ten student teams took part, competing for a total prize fund of 6,000 euros funded by the RTU Development Fund. Proposed ideas ranged widely, including a sports park, a new residential settlement, a greenhouse complex for vegetable growing, cycling paths and data centers. One team that did not make the final round proposed a "smart shrinking" scenario for the area, arguing that development does not always mean new construction. By the end of the event, it emerged that only about five of all participants had ever actually visited Saka.
Ties to the wind farm project
According to the author, most of the informational materials used during the hackathon were connected to a wind farm project planned by the company K2 Ventum, even though the project itself was not mentioned in the official event announcement. K2 Ventum intends to build Latvia's largest wind farm in Saka parish, with 46 turbines that would bring 20 million euros into the municipal budget over 25 years — and how to spend that money was the actual task given to the hackathon participants. At the same time, environmental impact assessments are underway in the parish for three other wind farm projects.
The event featured sharply differing views on public resistance to wind energy projects. The institute's director attributed the lack of prior notice to colleagues being on vacation and a shortage of resources, while an industry representative dismissed residents' objections as a "traveling circus." The author stresses the need to distinguish between informing the public and genuinely involving it in decision-making, calling for discussions grounded in evidence about health, environmental and economic impacts, with the participation of local residents themselves.
