Late Wednesday night, funding for the third phase of the Dogger Bank offshore wind power project began on the British side of the North Sea, apparently from Thursday morning message.
The gig project is being developed in a joint venture between Equinor and SSE Renewables. In November, it became clear that Eni will acquire a 20% stake in Dogger Bank C, and this transaction is expected to be completed during the first quarter of 2022.
The total funding, which includes a large lending facility, is £2.5 billion, plus about £0.4 billion in other lending facilities. About 70 percent of the investments in the Dogger Bank C wind farm itself are debt-financed. According to the parties, the loan financing is among the best financing ever obtained for the construction of an offshore wind farm in the UK.
A total of 28 banks and three export credit bureaus are involved.
- It was built by SSE and Equinor in a joint venture. SSE is the operator in the construction phase, while Equinor will be the operator when the park is operational.
- It will be the largest offshore wind farm in the world, consisting of the Creyke Beck A, Creyke Beck B and Teesside A projects.
- The three projects are expected to result in investments of around £9 billion in the period from 2020 to 2026.
- It is located more than 130 km east of the Yorkshire coast in the British North Sea.
- Each project will have an installed capacity of 1.2 gigawatts. Together, the three projects could cover around 5 per cent of the UK’s total energy needs.
Keldy: Equinor
When all three phases are completed, scheduled for March 2026, Dogger Bank will be the world’s largest offshore wind farm with a capacity of 3.6 gigawatts, equivalent to 5 per cent of the UK’s energy needs. Each phase is 1.2 gigawatts and is expected to generate 6 terawatts of electricity annually. The first phase, Dogger Bank A, is scheduled to begin operations in 2023, under a 50-year license.
In the first and second phases of the project, several Norwegian suppliers are already involved, as will be the case in the third phase.
Norwegian suppliers
Once again, Aibel will provide a transformer platform for the project, with Norwegian Export Financing (Eksfin) and a £130m loan guarantee, equivalent to 1.5 billion kroner in the back. With this loan guarantee, Eksfin exceeds $10 billion in offshore winds.
In recent years, the oil services company has shifted more towards offshore wind, and per. In the third quarter, the sector accounted for 43 percent of the order book of NOK 12 billion.
This is the fourth delivery to the European offshore wind industry Aibel with Eksfin as a supporter.
In mid-November, it was announced that Seaway 7 would be responsible for the transportation and installation of piling and transition blocks as well at Dogger Bank C beginning in 2024. In the announcement, Seaway 7 indicated that the contract value is between $50 and $150 million.
The vessel to be used is “Alfa Lift” which is currently under construction in China, and the vessel is expected to be delivered during the latter half of 2022 after which it will enter directly into a contract with Dogger Bank A.
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