India is looking into achieving a more diverse renewable energy mix by including offshore wind energy as a stable source of renewable energy. Realising India’s offshore wind potential will be beneficial for several reasons, e.g. to meet its Paris Agreement commitments, attract investments and growth, create local jobs, improve energy security and not least satisfy the need for more electrical power in a rapidly growing industrial economy.
Together, India and Denmark is launching a knowledge hub called the Centre of Excellence for Offshore Wind and Renewable Energy (CoE). This is formalised as a joint initiative between the Indian Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) as the host of the CoE and the Danish Energy Agency (DEA) as support. The initiative is starting up as a government-to-government initiative under the Indo-Danish Energy Partnership (INDEP). By bringing together industry, public authorities and civil society, the CoE will play a crucial role in facilitating and accelerating the implementation of the Indian offshore wind strategy.
In order for India to achieve its ambitious RE targets, a series of enabling initiatives are set in motion under the CoE. Through collaboration across various stakeholders, the CoE aims to create a transparent, facilitating and enabling environment for offshore wind in India. It shall develop and disseminate best available practices, methods and tools in order to minimize risk and reduce the overall cost of offshore projects. India can benefit from more than 30 years of Danish experiences and skills in areas such as marine spatial planning and the one-stop-shop concept for permitting and clearances in offshore wind, which streamlines crucial processes in the development of offshore wind projects. Furthermore, tools such as investor dialogue, auctioning and de-risking will facilitate investments. The CoE will play a crucial role in facilitating and implementing the actions needed to build a concrete pipeline of projects.
Various activities and studies are carried out within these four thematic areas. The final objective is to increase the amount of precise and relevant information, create a transparent process, and finally reduce overall risk and uncertainties for developers and industry. By reducing risk, there is a direct positive impact on advancing offshore wind projects and lowering the cost.
The vision for the CoE is to become a nationally and internationally recognized, respected and leading non-profit knowledge hub working for the rapid development of offshore wind energy in India. In the medium to long term, the vision is that the CoE will broaden to include a wider group of international governments and stakeholders, accumulating experience and best practices on offshore wind and become a regional knowledge hub.
India and Denmark have a long history of cooperating within the wind sector, including the development of the first onshore wind atlas for India and establishing the Wind Turbine Test Station at Kayathar. Today, India is the world’s fourth-largest onshore wind market by cumulative installation capacity. Therefore, it is only natural that Denmark and India embark on the journey of developing the offshore wind sector together. Denmark is a front-runner in the global green transition and a first mover and at the forefront of the offshore wind sector since early 1990s.