Vattenfall, Vestas, & PKA Combine For 353 Megawatt Swedish Wind Farm

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Following a slew of announcements, the 353 megawatt Blakliden/Fäbodberget wind farm in Sweden is underway and, upon completion, will be one of the country’s largest onshore wind farms.

A trio of announcements made on Wednesday heralded the beginning of construction for a 353 megawatt (MW) wind farm which will be built across the Blakliden and Fäbodberget wind parks located in Åsele and Lycksele Municipality in central Sweden. The project is jointly owned by Swedish power company Vattenfall (30%), Danish wind turbine manufacturer Vestas (40%), and Danish pension fund PKA (30%) and is expected to be completed and commissioned in the fourth quarter of 2021.

Vattenfall and Vestas announced on Wednesday that they had signed a wind turbine contract agreement for the project, where Vestas will provide 84 of its V136-4.2 MW turbines to the project — 50 of which will go to the Fäbodberget wind park, and 34 of which will go to the Blakliden wind park.

In addition to providing the wind turbines, Vestas acquired its 40% stake in the project alongside PKA, which made its first investment into onshore wind with this project. PKA, though having invested in five offshore wind farms in the past, makes its entrance into the onshore wind sector with this investment, continuing its doubling-down on renewable energy investments.

“The model created for this investment can be copied to other similar investments as we have seen it with our investments in offshore wind parks,” explained Peter Damgaard, CEO of PKA. “We focus on this type of investments because we continue to find interesting opportunities in combining good returns to our members with mitigation of climate change. For us it is good business and common sense, and we therefore don’t expect this to be our last investment in onshore wind.”

“This project underlines Vestas’ strong ability to work with our partners to optimise projects to make them even more competitive, which is key to our continued market-leadership in Sweden,” said Nils de Baar, President of Vestas Northern and Central Europe. “Both Vattenfall and PKA have strong track records within sustainable energy and we are honoured to partner with them on a project that exemplifies how Vestas’ solutions meet the full scope of our customers’ challenges, including financing.”

“The cost of renewable energy is going down, which is making the market more competitive and creating new opportunities,” added Anders Runevad, President and CEO of Vestas. “In this dynamic market, we continue to leverage our deep expertise across the entire value chain to develop solutions with our customers that produce the lowest cost of energy. With our partners on this project, I believe we have shown our ability to tailor the right solutions and, in doing so, advance our business according to our strategy.”

The annual output of the new wind farm will amount to around 1.1 terawatt-hours each year, enough to power the equivalent of 220,000 Swedish homes. Vattenfall also announced that, subject to project financing being in place, a 20-year Power Purchase Agreement will be closed with Norwegian aluminium and renewable energy company, Norsk Hydro. In its own announcement, Norsk Hydro expanded, explaining that the PPA is for annual baseload supply of 0.66 TWh from 2022 to 2021 and will contribute to supplying the company’s aluminum plants across Norway.

“I am extremely proud about this project in our home-country Sweden,” explained Gunnar Groebler, Senior Vice President and Head of Business Area Wind at Vattenfall. “The development of Blakliden/Fäbodberget profited a lot from the good collaboration with our partners, the turbine supplier Vestas and the local communities and stakeholders.”

“We are pleased to announce our expansion of onshore wind in Sweden,” added Magnus Hall, President and CEO of Vattenfall. “Blakliden/Fäbodberget represents an important step in our strategy to become fossil free within one generation and this time we do it in cooperation with strong partners in Vestas and PKA.”

Vattenfall’s commitment to being “fossil free within one generation” goes back to their Annual and Sustainability Report 2017 which was published in March of this year. The report outlined the company’s direction and intent to double-down on renewable energy production and sustainable energy solutions. The Report was accompanied by a visual change to the company’s branding which is intended to demonstrate “the determination to make it possible for everyone to live fossil-free within one generation.”