The Noordzeker consortium, one of the winners of the latest offshore wind auction in the Netherlands, will look to refine the 2 GW project before filing the decision on whether to progress development to the Dutch government, which is required by July 2024.
As reported earlier, Noordzeker, the consortium comprising SSE Renewables, Dutch pension fund ABP and its asset manager AGP, has been awarded the rights to develop the 2 GW IJmuiden Ver Alpha offshore wind project.
A joint venture between Vattenfall and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP), Zeevonk II, secured the rights to build the 2 GW IJmuiden Ver Beta offshore wind project.
Following the refinement of the project and the positive decision to progress the development, the consortium expects to reach the final investment decision for the project in late 2025.
The proposed offshore wind project would be located about 62 kilometres off the Dutch coast off IJmuiden and, if built with an installed capacity of around 2 GW, it would meet around seven per cent of the current Dutch electricity demand.
The Dutch government tender process for the Alpha site at IJmuiden Ver invited proposals focused on making a positive contribution to nature. Noordzeker’s plan includes turbine and wind farm designs that contribute to the protection of birds. The plan also contains measures that are expected to significantly reduce disturbance to marine mammals during construction and operation of the wind farm.
Noordzeker said it will not only build a wind farm, but also a ‘living laboratory’. More than 75 per cent of the wind turbines in the wind farm will have artificial reefs. These reefs will provide a protected habitat for, among other things, reef-building sand tube worms and various types of fish. In this way, the IJmuiden Ver Alpha wind farm is expected to increase biodiversity in this part of the North Sea. To this end, Noordzeker will also collaborate with Naturalis, the Dutch research institute for biodiversity.
Noordzeker will pay EUR 1 million a year and Zeevonk II will pay EUR 20 million a year, both for a period of 40 years, to the Dutch government for the rights to build and operate the wind farms. The developers will also reimburse the costs for the environmental impact assessments and the offshore site characterisation studies (approximately EUR 40 million in total).
The subsidy-free IJmuiden Ver Alpha and Beta wind farms are expected to be commissioned in 2029.
Located 62 kilometres off the west coast of the Netherlands, the IJmuiden Ver Wind Farm Zone contains three 2 GW sites: Alpha, Beta and Gamma.
The third site, IJmuiden Ver Gamma, will be put out to tender in 2025.