Iberdrola’s majority stake will mark its entry into Poland with Sea Wind planning seven offshore wind projects totalling 7.3GW
Iberdrola, the Spanish electric utility company has acquired 50% of Sea Wind’s shares, an offshore wind development company based in Sweden. With this move, Iberdrola has embarked on an ambitious geographical diversification strategy. The company has been exploring the Baltic Sea as a potential hub for its offshore wind projects. Currently, it has three wind projects based in Germany with a combined capacity of 836MW and majority stakes in eight Swedish wind projects with a combined capacity of up to 9GW.
This is the second time Iberdrola has collaborated with Sea Wind. Earlier in 2017, Iberdrola entered the German offshore wind market for the first time with Baltic Eagle, a 476MW facility expected to be operational by 2023. Iberdrola has stated that the alliance is open to willing Polish partners. In this partnership, Sea Wind has commissioned seven projects in the Polish Baltic Sea. These projects are in their early stages of development and have a potential capacity of up to 7.3GW.
The deal allows Iberdrola to position itself strategically in Poland’s nascent offshore wind market. Almost 80% of Poland’s electricity comes from coal. It has been under pressure from the EU to decarbonise its economy in line with the targets set in the Paris Agreement. In July this year, the Polish government officially declared their intention to collaborate on offshore wind projects in the Baltic Sea and began deliberating on an Offshore Wind Act. It stated that the first Polish offshore wind project will be operational by 2025 and by 2040, it wants to develop a total capacity of 10GW. Poland’s potential for offshore wind projects has been noticed by other international players. Danish energy companies Orsted and PGE have been pushing the Polish government to finalise a development deal by the end of 2020.
