Norway's Aker Offshore Wind and its and its majority owner Aker Horizons have entered into a cooperation agreement with Statkraft to explore possibilities for collaboration on offshore wind power projects on the Norwegian Continental Shelf (“NCS”).
"Aker Horizons, Aker Offshore Wind, and Statkraft will work together and utilize their complementary skills and expertise to explore the possibility to develop and operate large-scale offshore wind parks in Norway," Aker Offshore Wind.
"By harnessing excellent offshore wind resources in the North Sea, the Parties aim to export green electricity to European customers," the company, created last year as an Aker Solutions spinoff, added.
“With Statkraft and Aker coming together, two of the driving forces in Norway’s industrial development are ready to explore new opportunities in offshore wind. The building blocks and capabilities to be at the forefront of the energy transition are in place. We look forward to working with Statkraft to develop the offshore wind industry further, reducing emissions and creating new jobs for the future,” says Astrid Skarheim Onsum, Chief Executive Officer of Aker Offshore Wind.
Statkraft Chief Executive Officer, Christian Rynning-Tønnesen said: "By entering a cooperation with Aker Horizons and its subsidiary, Aker Offshore Wind, we are exploring a value-creative opportunity in Norway. We have expertise in the development and operations of wind power and have previously been engaged in offshore wind in the UK. Strong growth, falling technology costs, and a changed competitor landscape indicates that offshore wind will take a larger role in the European energy transition; therefore, we see the cooperation with Aker Offshore Wind as an opportunity for substantial value creation and accelerate Europe’s green transition."
Bottom-fixed offshore wind farm
The partnership will explore the opportunity for bottom-fixed offshore wind at Sørlige Nordsjø II (“SN2”), for which the Parties will establish an integrated project team, equally split between Aker Offshore Wind and Statkraft, for joint preparation and submission of an acreage application and further development activities.
"Aker Offshore Wind, being a pure play offshore wind developer with an ambition to become a full-fledged independent power producer (IPP), will play a leading role in the construction phase.
As the largest provider of green electricity in Europe, Statkraft will lead the operations phase and the marketing of the green electricity.
Aker Horizons, Aker’s investment platform dedicated to investing in, incubating, and developing companies within renewable energy and decarbonization technologies, will play an active role in the overall management of the cooperation, adding value with its expertise within financial structuring, strategy project execution and deploying digital solutions," the partners explained.
Together, the parties are evaluating export possibilities to Europe and the UK and electrification of oil and gas assets for possible value-adding offtake.
Kristian Røkke, Chief Executive Officer at Aker Horizons:"The cooperation agreement comes at a time when we see large global ambitions for offshore wind development and a window of opportunity to put Norway at the forefront of a growing global industry. For SN2, we have already identified and will leverage key differentiators, including Statkraft’s renewable energy track record and the Aker ecosystem’s deep domain expertise.
"Capabilities and experience across the Aker Horizons portfolio, which we significantly strengthened with the recent addition of Mainstream Renewable Power, will be mobilized to support Aker Offshore Wind in the development and implementation of the project. We look forward to working together with Statkraft towards our common goal of using one of the fastest-growing energy sources in the world to reach a carbon-free future.”
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