French energy company ENGIE said Monday it reached an agreement with Swiss asset manager SUSI to help develop what will be one of Norway's largest wind farms.

SUSI, through a renewable energy fund, takes an 80 percent stake in Project Tonstad, a planned 208 megawatt wind farm in southern Norway. The French energy company keeps a 20 percent stake in a 51-turbine facility.

Sandra Roche, the head of ENGIE's regional subsidiary, said the partnership marks a first step for the French company in the Nordic renewable energy market.

"SUSI's investment mandate is dedicated to financing the global energy transition," Marco van Daele, the chief investment officer at SUSI Partners, added in a statement.

The partners said they have a 25-year agreement to sell the power generated from Project Tonstad to Hydro Energi, a subsidiary of Norwegian aluminum producer Hydro. The aluminum company will use wind power at its plants in Norway.

Norway is one of the largest oil and natural gas producers in the world, sitting just behind Russia in terms of supplying the European energy market. Nearly all of its electricity, however, comes from renewable energy resources and hydropower is the main contributor.

The wind component of the renewable power sector is the lowest of all low-carbon resources. In a reflection of a changing energy landscape in Norway, energy major Equinor changed its name from Statoil to remove "oil" from its name. Apart from oil and gas production, Equinor has a major footprint in the global wind power sector.

In May, the Norwegian government proposed funding for studies into carbon capture, transport and storage facilities. Dubbed CCS, the technology is considered a necessary contributor to the global effort to cut emissions.

Project Tonstad will save about 180,000 tons of emissions of carbon dioxide, a potent greenhouse gas, each year. Across Europe, ENGIE has about 3.4 gigawatts of installed renewable energy.

Related Links
Wind Energy News at Wind Daily

Tweet

Thanks for being here; We need your help. The SpaceDaily news network continues to grow but revenues have never been harder to maintain. With the rise of Ad Blockers, and Facebook - our traditional revenue sources via quality network advertising continues to decline. And unlike so many other news sites, we don't have a paywall - with those annoying usernames and passwords. Our news coverage takes time and effort to publish 365 days a year. If you find our news sites informative and useful then please consider becoming a regular supporter or for now make a one off contribution.
SpaceDaily Contributor $5 Billed Once credit card or paypal		SpaceDaily Monthly Supporter $5 Billed Monthly paypal only

Batteries make offshore wind energy debut
Washington (UPI) Jun 27, 2018
The first battery used to store energy from wind power from a facility offshore Scotland was installed Wednesday, Norwegian energy company Equnior said. Equinor, formerly known as Statoil, started handing out contracts to deliver a 1 megawatt Lithium battery storage system for the Hywind wind farm off the Scottish coast last year. The company said Wednesday the system was connected so that Hywind power could move through submarine cables to the battery storage facility and then onto the Scottis ... read more