Denmark Suspends Open Door Offshore Wind Scheme

February 6, 2023, by Adnan Durakovic

The Danish Energy Agency has suspended the processing of offshore wind farm projects and other renewable energy projects under the open door scheme. The proceedings have been put on hold until further clarification of EU legal issues, the state agency said.

Denmark’s Ministry of Climate, Energy and Supply has, in dialogue with the government’s State Aid Secretariat, assessed that the granting of permits for offshore wind turbine projects and other renewable energy projects under the open door scheme may be in breach of EU law.

The Danish Energy Agency has therefore put the case processing of all pending cases under the open door scheme on hold until the scheme’s relation to EU law has been investigated in more detail. The same will apply to any new applications.

The Danish Energy Agency has informed the relevant parties involved and will continuously communicate to the actors about the further process for the individual cases.

The agency also said that it will clarify the questions that have been raised as soon as possible, with assistance from relevant ministries.

Back in August 2022, the Danish Energy Agency said that it had received 47 applications through the ‘open door’ process from 4 April to 30 August, of which 16 were rejected due to overlap with state land reservations.

Pausing the open door scheme is likely to affect Denmark’s plans for the first Power-to-X (PtX) tender which has already attracted the interest of major developers such as Ørsted and the Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP).