Equinor floats 800 MW floating wind project offshore South Korea

Equinor has started conducting wind measurements to investigate the possibility of developing and constructing an 800 MW floating offshore wind project in South Korea.

Two floating wind speed measurement installations using LiDAR technology have been deployed in the East Sea from Ulsan to conduct metocean data measurements for what will be the Firefly offshore wind project.

The LiDAR buoys were delivered by RPS and will be moored some 80km out to sea for the next year, collecting wind and wave data to determine the resource viability.

“The data gathered through this feasibility study will be important to determine the way forward for the project,” said Equinor’s Country Office Manager for South Korea Jacques Etienne Michel.

“Equinor has set a clear target that by 2035 we will increase our renewable capacity installed by 30 times from today. We are stepping up to become a global offshore wind major, and we see strong potential for offshore wind in South Korea, a country we consider to be an important market for floating offshore wind going forward.”

South Korea’s government defined an energy plan in 2017 to have at least 20% of electricity produced by renewables by 2030. New wind capacity is expected to make 16.5 GW, with nearly 12 GW being offshore.

In February 2019, Equinor and KNOC signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to jointly explore the opportunities of developing commercial floating offshore wind in South Korea.

Shortly after, the Norwegian company entered into an agreement with the City of Ulsan to cooperate on the development of floating wind projects.