Deep Wind Offshore and bp have formed a joint
venture to develop offshore wind opportunities in South Korea.
As part of the deal, bp has acquired a 55% stake
in Deep Wind Offshore’s early-stage offshore wind portfolio which
includes four projects across the Korean peninsula with a
potential generating capacity of up to 6GW.
South Korea is targeting almost 22% of its energy
to come from renewable sources by 2030 and is expected to become a
leading offshore wind region.
Deep
Wind Offshore has four offices in South Korea and has been working
in the country since 2006 through its owner Knutsen
Group, which is currently one of the biggest clients to the Korean
yards in the shipbuilding segment.
Today, bp has a 40-year history
in the country, including sizeable oil and LNG trading activities
and its Castrol lubricants business.
“South Korea is
an exceptional market to expand our growing offshore wind
footprint,” said Matthias Bausenwein,
bp’s Senior Vice President of Offshore Wind. “We are very happy to be working with a partner as
strong as Deep Wind Offshore, which has managed to build a strong
local team and develop these projects in collaboration with a
variety of Korean stakeholders. We look forward to developing
these gigawatts further so we can integrate these electrons in the
wider energy system and help the global and South Korean energy
transition.”
The permitting process for the four projects is already
underway having installed wind measurement devices during 2021 and
2022. bp and Deep Wind Offshore will now look to install
additional wind measurement systems and secure electricity
business licenses in the coming period.
bp has an
operating onshore wind portfolio in the US with a generating
capacity totalling 1.7GW. It is also building its global offshore
wind presence with a 5.2GW net capacity pipeline.
In the UK, with
partner EnBW, bp is developing the Morgan and Mona projects in the
Irish Sea and Morven in the North Sea off Scotland – together, the
projects have potential gross generating capacity of around 6GW.
In the US, bp with Equinor are developing up to 4.4GW through two
projects off the East Coast – Empire Wind and Beacon Wind.
Deep Wind Offshore is developing Utsira Nord
and Sørlige Nordsjø II in Norway, together with EDF Renewables. The company
is backed by industrial owners Knutsen Group, Haugaland Kraft and
SKL.
Knut Vassbotn, Deep Wind Offshore’s CEO, said, “We
are extremely excited about partnering with bp to help realize our
quality portfolio of projects in South Korea. There is a great fit
between our highly competent development team and the bp execution
capabilities. We look forward to integrating our teams to realize
the projects in a sustainable manner, in close collaboration with
local stakeholders to bring both clean electricity to the country
and opportunities to local supply chain and communities.”
