+ 21.01.2010 + EUROSOLAR president Hermann Scheer on proposed €30bn electricity grid to run under the North Sea.

The plan to build a network of high voltage direct current cables undersea stretching across the North Sea set to supply electricity from offshore wind parks and reservoirs in Norway may look fascinating at first sight. But at second glance it is misleading when taking everything into account. The apparent intent is to channel further wind power deployment primarily into offshore wind and thus into the power companies‘ hands. This would stand in the way of the desirable development into decentralised electricity generation in the hands of many – utilities and private operators. Generating electricity from decentralised sources is more appealing in terms of the overall economy and less expensive in terms of economics, which is also true for wind power.

It is striking: Every time multibillion Euro projects of massive scale are announced they always attract much public attention. It happened when the Desertec concept was presented, the widely overrated idea for power from the desert, as it happens now with the North Seas Countries' Offshore Grid Initiative. The fact that it enjoys broad support from governments to Greenpeace does not testify to the quality of the scheme.

The locations where the electricity is actually generated have to be the basis for network investments. This is primarily relevant in terms of the required structural change and move to renewable energy for power production while decentralised and regionally broadly distributed electricity generation in many places must be paramount. Therefore, regional and local producers accommodating a renewable energy mix in intelligent systems have to be put first when future investments will be made in electricity grids.

In this spirit it is reasonable to extend the supply lines from Norwegian hydroelectric power stations to Central Europe and to come, in so doing, more quickly to the necessary electricity mix entirely from renewable energy and more, to be able to rely on a back-up for the summer months when the wind is blowing less. At the same time before any investments in sub sea high voltage direct current cables for offshore wind parks in the North Sea will be made it must be a secured fact that the proposed production sites are practical and will be built. At this stage however it is not possible to present concrete numbers on what the capacity and output will be. It remains to be seen if 100 GW of offshore wind capacity in the North Sea (the equivalent of 100 coal-fired power plants of 1,000 megawatts each) becomes a reality as pledged by European power companies.

Indisputably, onshore production on land or near the coastlines is significantly less costly. This situation will not change. It is not by accident that compared to wind-power generation on land, the feed-in tariffs required for offshore wind generated electricity under the German Renewable Energy Sources Act are 40 per cent higher a kilowatt-hour. Showing a bias towards offshore wind generation will damage the move to renewable energy because it will become more costly and be postponed as a result. The only reason why power companies focus on it is that they do not want to lose the oligopoly they created for themselves as power generators by their nuclear and coal-fired power stations and their dictating prices.

Eurosolar 2010