The ESB and Danish multinational energy company Ørsted have signed an agreement to jointly develop an Irish offshore wind portfolio.
Ørsted becomes a 50/50 partner in a “pipeline of offshore wind development projects off the Irish coast”, the ESB said in a statement today.
The partnership has the potential to deliver up to five gigawatts (GW) of renewable energy and complementary renewable hydrogen projects, it said.
The first of these offshore wind projects is expected to compete in the next Irish offshore wind auction, ORESS 2.1, it said.
The joint projects involve sites earmarked for seven offshore wind farms off six counties.
The projects include Moneypoint One ( 400MW) and Moneypoint Two (1GW) off Clare, Loch Garman (600MW) off Wicklow, Helvick Head (800MW) off Waterford, Celtic One (700MW) and Celtic Two (800MW) off Cork and Waterford, and Sea Stacks (800MW) off Dublin and Wicklow
The two companies jointly own the Neart na Gaoithe offshore wind energy farm being developed off the Scottish coast.
The new agreement was welcomed by Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Simon Coveney when he joined Jim Dollard of the ESB and Duncan Clark, head of UK and Ireland at Ørsted at Cork Chamber.
“From the world’s first offshore turbine in Denmark in 1991 to the world’s largest operational offshore wind farm, Hornsea 2 in the UK, Ørsted has been a driving force behind the commercialisation of the offshore wind industry across Europe, Asia, and America,” Clark said in a joint statement.
In November 2021 Norwegian company Equinor pulled out of its joint development plans with the ESB on offshore wind.