Utsira Nord floating wind, the first offshore floating wind tender in Norway, has drawn two large offshore wind consortia competing for the actual areas of the Utsira Nord region. Industry heavyweights applied to the Ministry of Energy, a major milestone on the ambitious offshore knowledge development program in the country. The competition for state aid will decide the winner as the one with the least support needed to actualize their project.
Competitive applications in project areas are made by two powerful consortia
The Norwegian Ministry of Energy also said that two well-established consortia had applied to develop floating wind projects at Utsira Nord. Some of the bidders are Harald Haram AS, being a Jpass and a partnership between Deep Wind Offshore Norway AS and EDF Renewable International SAS, and a consortium of Equinor Utsira Nord AS and Vaurgro Utsira Nord AS.
Two consortia are competing for Utsira Nord
Two entities, called consortia, comprising powerful participants, have applied to participate in the contest of floating offshore wind in Utsira Nord, thereby mentioning hopeful inclinations by Minister of Energy Terje Aasland. The applications are the years-long preparations representing years with both consortia developing their respective works since 2021.
The ministry will now start to evaluate the applications in connection with five predetermined qualitative criteria, such as cost level, project maturity, innovation and technological development, implementation ability, sustainability, and beneficial impacts of a project.
The evaluation process is aimed at looking at the evaluation criteria system
The tendering process is carried out by a staged system in which a maturation period between the allocation and the competition for the subsidies occurs. Three 500 MW areas of the project will be assigned to the developers who score the highest, according to non-discriminatory and objective criteria in the first stage.
Norway intends to separate its project areas in the first half of 2026, and there are no financial requirements or fees related to the initial allocation. This is a holistic assessment that takes into account numerous factors that cannot be pointed out with just the cost factor and instead focuses on technological innovation and wider economic advantage.
The competitive state aid bid is planned to take place in 2028/29 after the maturation period. Applicants wishing to be involved in the subsidy auction must have made a licence application and bank guarantee, and the auction is conducted when two or more developers fulfill the conditions.
Existing collaborations have floating wind experience
Since 2021, Equinor and Vårgrønn have been joining forces in their Utsira Nord project based on the successful Hywind floating wind concept. This collaboration will be based on the experience that Equinor holds with the first commercial floating wind farm in the world, Hywind Scotland, and the new Hywind Tampen value chain.
Key stakeholders such as EDF Renewables and Deep Wind Offshore have already prepared their competitive bid since 2021, choosing to award Moreld Ocean Wind as their developer of floating wind foundations in 2023. Their Harald Hårfagre initiative is a strategic alliance between a global renewable energy company and a Norwegian offshore company. No one can make a bid above the upper limit of NOK 35 billion (around EUR 3 billion) as it can guarantee the cost-efficient use of public funds.
As part of this, Aasland stressed that offshore wind has been among the core focus areas of the government in order to provide an adequate power supply in the years to come. Floating offshore wind in Utsira Nord during the development stage will be involved in the transfer of technology and cost minimization. The Utsira Nord award in Norway is a significant move towards the government objective, which is to assign 30,000 MW of offshore wind power by 2040, and floating technology is vital to reach deeper water sources.