Investors to pay Germany billions of euros for offshore wind farm sites

After several auctions in recent years to support offshore wind farm construction in Germany showed that investors were willing to “compete” by bidding for zero operating support, a change is now underway. In Germany’s first offshore wind auction this year, bidders competed to offer the highest possible price they were willing to pay for sites for wind farm construction. Germany is expected to collect more than 12 billion euros by the middle of this century for sites awarded in the latest auction, where hundreds or even thousands of wind turbines could be built.

In recent years, Germany has switched to an auction system to support the construction of large-scale renewable energy projects. The country regularly adjusts how the auctions work and the conditions they impose, responding to investor interest—or lack of it—as well as current market conditions.

One of the major changes was to auctions for offshore wind farms, where developers in several recent rounds bid for zero operating support. In this case, it was impossible to choose a winner based on the lowest guaranteed purchase price requested.