A hotel conference room filled with people, in itself a rare sight during the last 18 months, all eager to listen to representatives from Norseman. The consortium plans to apply for a license in Sørlige Nordsjø II to develop and operate a bottom-fixed offshore wind farm with a capacity of 1400 MW over 400 square kilometers.
Builder, owners, and operators are the German giant utility EnBW (Energie Baden-Württemberg) and Norgesgruppen.
National Oilwell Varco, Aker Solutions and Seafront are three GCE NODE participants already selected as project suppliers.
Norseman’s development of Sørlige Nordsjø II will cost NOK 30-35 billion, and the ambition is that at least 50 per cent of that will be contracts awarded to the Norwegian supplier industry. Bases for operations, maintenance and logistics will be built in Rogaland and Agder counties.
EnBW has been demonstrating its offshore strength in designing, constructing and operating wind farms since 2009.
“We are currently developing offshore wind in more than 10 countries and currently have 1GW in operation, 0.9 GW in advanced development and another 3 GW secured. Europe is our home market,” explained Jakob Bollwinkel, Manager Portfolio Development Wind Offshore at EnBW.
The company has more than 11,000 suppliers in 39 countries and will be looking for more in Norway, if Norseman wins a license to operate in the Norwegian North Sea.
“Working with local suppliers has great advantages. We would like to have close relations with a network of local suppliers for this project,” says Grubel.
That is good news for local industry.
“The future of Agder is in the blue and renewable economy. No other region has a better potential to be the offshore wind capitol of Norway,” says Mathias Bernander, Chair of the Committee for Business, Climate and Environment at Agder county.
