Major offshore wind power developers have started submitting plans for several gigawatts of new offshore wind farm projects in Brazil.
Iberdrola’s Brazilian subsidiary, Neoenergia, has three offshore wind energy projects in the licensing phase.
Iberdrola actively participates “in discussions to define the best regulation to adopt for the development of offshore wind energy” in Brazil.
Neoenergia’s projects total around 9 GW and are distributed among the waters of the states of Rio Grande do Sul, Rio de Janeiro and Ceará.
Iberdrola is considering 15 MW wind turbines with rotors up to 245 meters in diameter for wind projects.
Equinor plans to install 4 GW of offshore wind energy in Rio and Espírito Santo in Brazil.
According to the project, the wind power plants will be installed about 20 km from the coast, at depths of between 15 and 35 meters. There will be a total of 320 wind turbines, 160 per wind farm, each with a nominal capacity of 12 MW.
Each wind farm will have an offshore substation for the conversion and flow of energy towards the coast. On land, another substation is connected to the interconnected transmission network.
Equinor started the Ibama license for the Aracatu I and Aracatu II offshore wind farms, with 4 GW, with 2 GW in each and the possibility of expansion to 2.33 GW. The plan is to install the wind turbines of the first wind farm on the coast of Rio de Janeiro and the second, between the states of Rio and Espírito Santo.
These are high capacity wind power projects. For comparison, a total of 6.1 GW of power was installed throughout 2019 in offshore wind farms around the world, according to GWEC. It is a growing market, especially in China, but it is beginning to take its first steps in Brazil.
Aracatu I and Aracatu II are Equinor’s first two offshore wind projects in Brazil. The company has opted for the solution in several countries in Europe, Asia and the US.
It is part of the company’s strategy to reduce CO2 emissions set at 8 kg per barrel of oil equivalent produced by the company, originally focused on the production of natural gas and oil in offshore fields, including in Brazil – Peregrino (post -sal) and develops Bacalhau, a delimited pre-salt field in the Carcará area.
Last year, Equinor and SSE were awarded the tender for the Dogger Bank offshore wind project in the North Sea region, until then the largest offshore wind farm in the world, which will have an installed capacity of 3.6 GW of energy. The project will require investments of 9 billion pounds between 2020 and 2026.
Also last year, Equinor and Orsted won the New York State tender for the construction of Empire Wind and Sunrise offshore wind farms, respectively. The projects will require investments of more than US $ 3 billion and, according to the local government, they should generate more than 1,600 direct jobs.
The construction of Empire Wind, with 816 MW of installed capacity, will require the installation of 60 to 80 turbines. The project has an estimated investment of around US $ 3 billion and is expected to begin operations in 2024. The company expects the project to supply 500,000 homes in New York State.
The company announced last year the final decision to invest in Hywind Tampen, which will interconnect the Gullfaks and Snorre fields, an estimated investment of US $ 660 million, with offshore wind turbines. The project includes 11 wind turbines with a total installed capacity of 88 MW, which can supply 35% of the annual demand of the Snorre A and B and Gullfaks A, B and C platforms.
The company is also studying, with China Power International Holding (CPIH), the development of offshore wind power projects in Europe and China.
