Norway may contribute the fewest turbines under the pact, BloombergNEF forecasts, because its continental shelf drops sharply into deep water, making it difficult to site traditional turbines bolted to the seafloor. Norway has experimented with floating turbines, but the technology is much less mature. And the country’s offshore energy industry has traditionally focused on oil and gas. (Landlocked Luxembourg, which lacks a shoreline, is contributing financing to the deal.)
Europe’s homegrown offshore wind giants, such as Norway’s Equinor and Denmark’s Ørsted, are likely vendors for the buildout, said Gaurav Purohit, the Germany-based vice president of European asset finance at the credit-ratings agency Morningstar DBRS. With the U.S. government bearing down on projects such as Ørsted’s Revolution Wind in New England and Equinor’s Empire Wind in New York, he said the North Sea buildout would allow the companies to redirect capital back to Europe.
Other likely winners of the offshore wind push include the German utility RWE, German transmission giants TenneT and Amprion, and the French energy giant TotalEnergies, which has committed to a big renewables buildout — a contrarian move among oil majors. While China’s soaring offshore wind companies are looking to enter the European market, “I do think European developers will benefit more,” Purohit said.
But he cautioned that the high cost of building offshore wind, particularly when interest rates are elevated and inflation is driving up the price of materials, means that projects would likely “need financial institutions to take a stake.”
Increasing the transmission connections is key, said Matt Kennedy, an executive who heads up sustainability issues for IDA Ireland, the government agency that attracts foreign investment. Right now, the island nation on the EU’s western fringe is connected to other grid systems only by power lines to the United Kingdom. In 2028, the Celtic Interconnector, a 700-megawatt power line connecting Ireland to France, is set to come online, establishing the first direct transmission between the Emerald Isle and the continent. Kennedy said the two-way line will likely hasten construction of offshore wind in Ireland, where the industry has been stunted by planning bottlenecks and, like Norway, a steep continental shelf dropoff. Ireland, which already has a large onshore wind industry, has 7 gigawatts of offshore turbines approved.
Establishing a link to France “really sets the pace for us to be able to deliver on our commitment,” Kennedy said.
“This is a radical step,” he added. “It’s a massive step for Ireland in terms of providing that enabling architecture to access the European market. This will allow us to export an abundance of renewable energy that we plan to have, but also in times of need allows us to import.”
The pact is not renewable energy for the sake of going green, said Ed Miliband, the British secretary of state for energy security and net zero.
“Our view on offshore wind energy is hard-headed, not soft-hearted,” he said, according to Euronews. “I think offshore wind is for winners. Different countries will pursue their national interests, but we are very clear where our interests lie.”
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Great Job Alexander Kaufman & the Team @ Canary Media Source link for sharing this story.
