Offshore Electricity Infrastructure in Europe - European Wind Energy ...

conclusions and recommendations
6.5 Overall recommendations
Developing integrated solutions requires suitable political,
regulatory and market conditions. Concerted
technology development and research is also needed.
This is in order to provide a stable framework, within
which both wind power generation and international
exchange can be at least as profitable as when they
are carried out independently.
• Regulatory
– For solutions that involve two countries, for
example tee-in and hub-to-hub, the operation
of the grid can be managed through cooperation
of the national TSOs, just as they manage
onshore interconnectors. The grid up to the offshore
wind farms can be seen as an extension
of the onshore grid. The interconnector part can
be seen as a normal cross-border point-to-point
interconnector.
– For multilateral solutions (fully meshed grid
design), the operation is more complex and in
particular in the case of grid faults the fault
isolation and fault correction have to be well coordinated.
Very good cooperation between the
TSOs will be needed to efficiently manage the
interconnections. A first step in such cooperation
was already taken with CORESO 47 .
– Regulatory concepts for efficient ownership
structures and profit allocation are needed to
accelerate offshore grid development. If a wind
farm is teed-in or split to two countries, the electricity
it produces can be sent to the country with
the highest price. Thus this would give additional
benefits to the wind farm operator. At the same
time the electricity from wind energy constrains
trade and reduces trading benefits, leading to
conflicts of interest between the parties involved.
Thus, profit sharing concepts are needed
that allow profitable operation of both the interconnector
and the wind farm, and additionally
return a significant share of the benefits to the
consumer within a proper regulatory framework.
If the latter is not the case, there is the risk of
low public support (for example in the case of
47 CORESO S.A. http://www.coreso.eu/
Norway where customers will have to pay higher
prices).
– Permitting procedures even for national offshore
hub connections and single wind farms take
considerable time and effort. The level of complexity
increases strongly for international grid
infrastructure.
– Permitting procedures should be reviewed to
facilitate international projects. Ideally, the offshore
project can be handed in for approval in
an identical form to the authorities of all relevant
Member States.
– Such a process should be fostered at national
level and can be supported at European level or
regional level, for instance by the NSC’OGI.
• Political coordination
– Support for offshore wind energy should be
made compatible with integrated solutions. The
offshore wind power generation should receive
its necessary support irrespective of which
country the electricity is flowing to. To achieve
this goal it is not necessary to harmonise the
European support schemes, but it is necessary
to make them compatible with one another.
– Hub-to-hub interconnections, tee-in connections
and split wind farm connections can be beneficial
even when the infrastructure elements are
added to already existent infrastructure, such as
a tee-in to an existing interconnector or a hubto-hub
connection to existing wind farm hubs.
When the interconnection is international, this
requires bilateral arrangements, adaptations or
exemptions to the national support schemes.
– The offshore grid development depends to a
large extend on a strong onshore grid that allows
the electricity to be transported further. The
system should always be considered as a whole
and it should be emphasised that the development
of an offshore grid can be supported by
accelerating the construction of onshore grid
reinforcements.
– The optimal offshore grid design depends strongly
on the timing and location of offshore wind
farm development. Even though OffshoreGrid
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