World's largest wind farm to appear in the North Sea
Norwegian state-owned Equinor and Britain's SSE Renewables have signed a $ 7.3 billion energy project financing deal to build the first two phases of the world's largest wind farm Dogger Bank in the North Sea.
Each phase of the project will have a capacity of 1.2 GW, making Dogger Bank the largest offshore wind farm in the world when all phases are completed in 2026. The project will generate enough electricity to meet 5% of the UK's annual demand, which is the equivalent of 6 million households.
SSE Renewables will lead construction and Equinor will lead operations. Onshore construction has begun and Dogger Bank is set to take its first electricity out of the way for the summer of 2023. Commercial operations for A and B are due to begin in 2025.
Dogger Bank marks another step in Equinor's stated plan to become "the world's offshore wind power giant." It aims to increase wind power by 30 times by 2035 and achieve zero net emissions by 2050. Equinor is evolving into a “broad energy company,” expecting oil and gas demand to slowly decline from 2030.