The Danish Energy Agency is investigating a new location for Hesselø

The tender for the Hesselø Offshore Wind Farm was put on hold this summer when Energinet's preliminary results of preliminary studies showed difficult soil conditions in the form of soft clay soil in the uppermost meters of the seabed at the site for the Hesselø Offshore Wind Farm, which will be located 30 km. north of Zealand in Kattegat.

Energinet's processing of the preliminary studies data is now so advanced that the Danish Energy Agency and Energinet are inviting potential bidders to a technical dialogue running from the end of October to the end of November on whether the seabed conditions challenge the realization of the Hesselø Offshore Wind Farm within the current political framework, which includes the support model, a capacity of 800-1,200 MW and the time horizon.

Based on the market's input and its own analyses, the Danish Energy Agency will assess whether the Hesselø Offshore Wind Farm can be offered with the currently decided framework.

Investigating new location

At the same time as the call for the market dialogue, the Danish Energy Agency has also initiated an emergency solution. The agency has thus initiated a so-called fine screening to look at possible alternative locations for the Hesselø Wind Farm, which in the Energy Agreement from 2018 is called "park 2". The areas can be brought into play if further analysis shows that the location at Hesselø is unsuitable.

- There is not long until 2027, when the park is to be completed, and that is why we are currently investigating alternative options, says Ture Falbe-Hansen, press officer at the Danish Energy Agency.

A fine screening is an initial assessment of whether an area is suitable for the establishment of an offshore wind farm, including what the consequences are in terms of, among other things, costs, network work and natural, environmental and planning conditions. The fine screening includes areas registered in the Marine Plan and includes both areas that have previously been fine screened and new areas.

The alternative locations for the park are:

• A scaled-down Hesselø area + the area south of the current Hesselø area
• A scaled-down Hesselø area + Kattegat 2 – an area west of the current Hesselø area
  Kriegers Flak 2
• A scaled-down Hesselø area + Kriegers Flak 2 North - the northern of the two sites that make up Kriegers Flak 2
• North Sea 1 - the areas south of the planned Thor offshore wind farm.

The proposed locations can be seen in the map at the top of the article.