Norway's Hafslund takes 50% stake in owner of lake-based wind project off Sweden

Oslo city-owned utility and Norwegian peer Cloudberry Clean Energy form 50-50 joint-venture for wind projects, including 100MW array in Lake Vänern

Already existing turbines on Lake Vänern
Already existing turbines on Lake VänernFoto: Innovent

Cloudberry Clean Energy (CCE) and Hafslund, the utility owned by the Norwegian capital city of Oslo, have entered into a share purchase agreement for a 50% stake in CCE’s offshore wind unit, Cloudberry Offshore Wind (COW)

Completion of the sale to Hafslund of half of COW – which indirectly owns Stenkalles Grund, a 100MW project in Sweden’s Lake Vänern, the world's largest clean water wind farm – is expected today (Monday).

“Stenkalles Grund is an exciting project that allows Hafslund to rapidly establish presence in the Swedish power market,” Hafslund deputy chief executive Martin Lundby said when the 50-50 joint venture was first announced in July. “It will bring new renewable power to the market already by 2025.

“We are impressed by Cloudberry’s efforts in developing the project and look forward to the collaboration towards FID and realisation of Stenkalles Grund.”

CCE chief development officer Charlotte Bergqvist added the lake project will be “the start of a long and extended cooperation”.

CEE has earlier said it aims for 2.5GW of offshore wind in the Baltic Sea region by 2030, and sees Stenkalles Grund as stepping stone for the company in this respect. CEE so far has mostly been active in smaller wind and hydro projects.
Sweden is expected to greatly boost its offshore wind capacity after the outgoing government has pledged state-owned transmission system operator Svenska Kraftnät will provide some 10GW of offshore grid links mostly free of charge to the developers to spur development off the country’s 3,200km-long coast.

It is yet unclear whether the new right-leaning government likely to take power in Stockholm after elections earlier this month will pursue the same policies.

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Published 19 September 2022, 14:17Updated 19 September 2022, 23:23
EuropeNorwaySwedenOffshore windMarkets