In focus: Renewables take over at the finish line

As the world prepares to say goodbye to an eventful 2022, offshore energy industries are reviewing their activities and making new plans to deliver on the net-zero target. Despite numerous challenges to this goal, the year behind us ends the similar way it started – with renewables in the spotlight.

The last week of 2022 saw the launch of a €240 million call by the Ministry for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge (MITECO) of Spain to promote pilot projects, test platforms, and port infrastructure for marine renewable energy.

The €240 million funding pot will be divided into four subprograms and will support research into marine energy and the development of testing infrastructure, and prototype demonstrations – including tidal energy, wave energy, and floating solar devices, as well as both fixed and floating offshore wind technology with the associated equipment and technological solutions.

In addition to marine energy, the fast-growing offshore wind sector is finding its place among oil and gas players as well.

An example was shown by Norwegian oil and gas company Neptune Energy and Danish offshore wind developer Ørsted which partnered up to explore powering new integrated energy hubs in the UK North Sea with offshore wind-generated electricity.

The two parties and Goal7 signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to examine the potential to supply renewable electricity from Ørsted’s Hornsea offshore wind projects to power future Neptune-operated hubs in the UK North Sea.

As described, the hubs have the potential to combine multiple energy systems, including existing oil and gas production assets, carbon storage and hydrogen production facilities and could extend the life of producing fields and support the economic case for electrification with renewable energy, to keep carbon emissions low.

The North Sea is also a planned location for the new Triton Link interconnector project being developed by Danish and Belgian transmission system operators (TSOs) Energinet and Elia to connect the high-voltage grids of the two countries through two energy islands.

To this end, Energinet and Elia issued a contract notice seeking environmental engineering consultancy services for the development of the subsea cable route for the interconnector project.

HOPE Group, an Italian company specialising in producing green hydrogen using renewable energy sources, also made headlines with its application for a maritime concession to build a 675 MW floating offshore wind farm in the Strait of Sicily.

The electricity generated at the wind farm will be collected at the offshore substation and then transformed to 400 kV prior to being delivered to a 150 MW onshore hydrogen plant and to the national grid via 400 kV export cables.