RWE wins two German onshore auction deals

RWE has been awarded two contracts in the latest German onshore wind auction.

The company will build and operate another wind farm in North Rhine-Westphalia and one in Schleswig-Holstein, after successful bids to the Federal Network Agency.

After commissioning in 2025, the 10 turbines will be able to produce enough green electricity to cover the needs of around 42,000 households.

RWE Renewables Europe & Australia chief executive Katja Wünschel said: "I am delighted that with the new wind farms we are setting the next building blocks for the energy transition in our home market of Germany.

"I would like to thank our development team as well as the authorities involved at both locations.

"With their speed and the approval of a wind farm within just over a year, they show that faster approval procedures can go from being the exception to the rule."

RWE will build its Aldenhoven wind farm on recultivated areas of the Inden opencast mine in the Düren district.

With a total output of 34.2MW, the six turbines will be able to generate enough green electricity to supply around 24,000 households per year after commissioning in 2025.

As early as the first quarter of 2024, the RWE team will start building the path and setting up the construction site.

RWE's Lasbek wind farm is located in the Hamburg metropolitan region, in the district of Stormarn in Schleswig-Holstein.

The company will dismantle the existing six turbines with a total capacity of 10.8MW and replace them with four more powerful machines.

RWE's planners will benefit from the experience gained in other repowering projects: new construction is scheduled to begin in winter 2024/2025, while the old hardware will remain on the grid for as long as possible.

After commissioning, the wind farm will be 22.8MW and generate green electricity for around 18,000 households.

Out of an advertised quantity of 2087MW, 167 bids were submitted with a total bid volume of 1981MW, according to the Federal Network Agency.

In this round, the Federal Network Agency only had to exclude two bids from the procedure due to formal errors. As a result, 165 bids were accepted.

The contract volume amounted to 1967MW, meaning 6377MW was awarded in 2023, almost twice as much as in 2022 (3225MW), the Agency said.

The bid values of the successful bids range between 5.88 ct/kWh and the maximum permissible value of 7.35 ct/kWh.

At 7.31 ct/kWh, the average, volume-weighted bid value is just below the maximum value and very close to the previous round's average of 7.32 ct/kWh.

The two largest bids were again for sites in Schleswig-Holstein (416MW, 42 awards), Lower Saxony (312MW, 25 awards), North Rhine-Westphalia (309MW, 31 awards), followed by Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania (222MW, 16 awards).

Federal Network Agency president Klaus Müller said: "The fact that the contract volume in 2023 is twice as high as last year gives me hope.

"In order to achieve the expansion targets, the trend of a significant increase must continue."

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