On humans should be encompassed within a 1000 m wide zone. So as to illustrate the effects in the arbitral adoption of the distance criterion, there also were carried out added analyses with regard to 2000 m wide buffer zone. Landscape-related Criteria 1st, self-evident landscape-related criterion on constraining wind farm siting are the locations protected by legal regulations on nature and landscape. The nature conservation program in Poland consists of 4 area-based protection types ranked differently in terms of conservation restrictions,1 too as comprises Natura 2000 sites (a network of nature protection places in the territory from the European Union). National parks and nature reserves are the highest-rank forms of nature protection (totally excluded from any financial activities). These protected locations represent a really robust, decisive criterion. Within the case with the remaining two forms of nature conservation, i.e., landscape parks andNational parks, nature reserves, landscape parks and protected landscape locations (Act of 16 April 2004 on Nature Conservation, consolidated text in Official Journal on the PubMed ID:http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19969212 Laws of 2013, Item 627).protected landscape places (significantly less restrictive), the possibility of siting wind turbines is determined through SEAs and EIAs (on a mandatory basis). Likewise, wind farm siting within the Natura 2000 network is decided by means of precisely the same procedures. In the analyses carried out within the present study, each of the aforementioned protected regions have been classified as limited for wind farm siting. These were regarded as as the important areas in view of nature protection, as they comprise distinctive and irreplaceable biological diversity (Huber et al. 2010). Poland’s method of area-based nature protection types is of comprehensive nature: it serves not only conservation purposes, but additionally the protection of cultural resources and recreational values. All the three elements of sustainable development (ecological, financial, and socio-cultural) justify the exclusion of protected places from wind farm siting. Taking into account the connectivity of Poland’s nature conservation method, a network of ecological corridors established in the nation was also classified as one of many essential constraints on wind farm siting. Nearby disturbances inside ecological corridors can result in considerable modifications in ecological network functioning at regional and higher than regional levels (Chmielewski 2013; Huber et al. 2010; Richling and Solon 2011). Poland’s network of ecological corridors (comprising forest complexes, wetlands, and surface waters) was designated under Report ten of Council Directive 92/43/EEC of 21 May 1992 around the conservation of organic habitats and of wild fauna and flora. In accordance with Poland’s law, wind farm siting in any forest region is banned, but, the problem is controversial. The truth is, some authors believe that forest locations are the most appropriate for wind farm siting, that is justified by the minimization of adverse impacts of wind P7C3 biological activity installations around the visual atmosphere (Cowell 2010). Inside the present study, forest complexes have been excluded from wind farm siting as a consequence of recognition of their natural and social functions. Landscape values (aesthetic qualities) are integrated into consistent and complicated Poland’s nature conservation technique, as well. The locations with outstanding and high landscape values have been classified because the constraint for wind farms. For the objective of this study, there was performed environmental evaluation (valorizatio.