Equinor, Korea National Oil Corporation (KNOC) and the Korean power company Korea East-West Power have formed a consortium to develop the Donghae 1 floating offshore wind project
The consortium is planning to develop a 200-MW floating windfarm close to the KNOC-operated Donghae natural gas field off the coast of Ulsan in South Korea.
It will carry out a feasibility study for the windfarm, including using the Donghae 1 platform as a substation for the windfarm.
Pending results of the feasibility study, the consortium will start constructing a floating offshore windfarm in 2022, with production start-up and first power in 2024.
Equinor senior vice president new energy solutions Stephen Bull said, “We are very pleased to be member of the partnership involved in realising the first floating offshore windfarm in Asia.
“If we succeed in realising the project, the Donghae floating wind project will be the world’s largest floating windfarm, more than twice the size of Hywind Tampen on the Norwegian continental shelf.
“A floating offshore windfarm of this size will help further increase the competitiveness of floating offshore wind power in the future.”
South Korea has decided to transform its energy mix from nuclear power and coal to renewable energy. The share of renewable energy in power production is due to increase to 20% by 2030.
The country is aiming to add 49 GW to renewable production capacity by 2030, of which solar power accounts for 31 GW and wind 16 GW.
Another energy major, Shell, also recently signed a joint development agreement to build a windfarm offshore South Korea.
It has entered into an agreement to build a floating windfarm offshore South Korea with the developer of a twin-turbine floating wind concept.
CoensHexicon Co Ltd in South Korea will partner with Shell to develop, construct and operate a floating windfarm approximately 40 km offshore from the city of Ulsan.
As part of a project for another floater offshore South Korea, a floating LiDAR system was installed earlier this year to collect wind resource data.
Installing the LiDAR is one of the first steps in developing Green Investment Group’s project 60 km east of Seosang-myon, Ulju-gun, Ulsan City.
The Ulsan project is a 1.4-GW offshore windfarm which is being progressed in three separate phases. Development of the first 400-MW phase is due to be completed in 2022.
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