Romania and Bulgaria have similar offshore wind conditions as Japan and South Korea and the technology designed for those markets will be deployed in this region when the large-scale offshore wind projects will begin. One critical element for the development of this sector in the region is given by the ”very complicated bathymetry” of the Black Sea.
”What is relevant to the Black Sea is the advancement of technology, especially the floating foundations. Why is it important? Because the Black Sea has very complicated bathymetry. It gets very deep quite quickly. Floating foundations will change the dynamic in that sector quite substantially. If you look at East Asia, for example, today in Japan and South Korea, which are very active markets for offshore wind, in those markets wind speeds are very similar to what you have here in Romania and Bulgaria. So what we believe is going to happen is technology designed for those markets will eventually be also employed in this region”, said Alex Gospodinov, CEO of hooracán energy, at the conference “Regional Approach Sofia”, organized by Energynomics.
When the European wind turbines industry moved in markets like India, or East Asia, where wind speeds are much lower, the manufacturers designed and produced different type of wind turbines, specifically tailored for lower wind speeds.
The price of the floating foundations is currently high but by 2030 the cost will be lower than that of the fixed foundations. On the other hand, wind turbine technology is advancing and the efficiency of the wind turbines is increasing.
Gospodinov added that very high efficiency can be achieved even in a low wind speeds conditions market and the potential investors in offshore wind ”have very high expectation of returns”. However, the expected rate of return for investors will come down in Romania and Bulgaria and will be similar to those in Czech Republic or Poland because the two neighbouring countries will be perceived „less risky than what they are today”. This perception will also contribute to the decrease of the price of energy that will be produced by the future offshore wind turbines and by 2030 will make it competitive with the price of the power generated by the onshore renewables.
As more onshore renewable projects are being build both in Romania and Bulgaria, the land available for these projects reduces, so investors will eventually run out of good inland sites. Unlike the difficulty of access to lands suitable for inland wind investments, offshore projects do not need the approval of landowners, but one of the problems is that ”the government keeps changing”.
hooracán energy has identified three offshore wind sites in Bulgaria and one site in Romania so far. ”Romania is a little bit more complicated because almost entire territory of territorial waters and exclusive economic zone in Romania is concessioned for oil and gas”, said Gospodinov.
The company is focused on Romania, Bulgaria and Moldova where is trying to create scalable portfolios of onshore / offshore wind energy and battery energy storage projects. In Moldova, hooracán energy has a pipeline of offshore wind projects of about 200 MW.
”We believe that there is potential for the Black Sea today for offshore wind. If you look at offshore wind in the Black Sea today, it’s of course not competitive. You wouldn’t go and finance any project today, because your LCOE, your lowest cost of energy, will be north of 100 euros per MW. But what needs to be understood is these projects are very different to onshore renewables, and the timeline to develop them is much, much longer. When we talk about offshore wind, it typically takes 8 to 10 years. And your final investment decision will be made six years from today, if you start today”, Gospodinov concluded.
The conference “Regional Approach Sofia” was organized by Energynomics with the support of our partners: Eaton Electric, Finder, Kawasaki Gas Turbine Europe.