The Estonian Consumer Protection and Technical Regulatory Authority (CPTRA) has announced that two auctions for the development of offshore wind farms in the Liivi 1 and Liivi 2 sea areas will take place in December 2023 and January 2024.
Competing applications were submitted to CPTRA for the development of offshore wind farms in the Liivi 1 and Liivi 2 areas.
The Authority said seven companies (OÜ Utilitas Wind, Liivi Offshore OÜ, Aker Offshore Wind Europe, Viru Keemia Grupp, Sunly Wind OÜ, Edel Offshore Wind OÜ and UAB Ignitis Renewables Projektai 6) qualified to participate in the auctions for Liivi 1 and Liivi 2 sea areas.
The auctions will take place electronically in the online environment for state land auction www.riigimaaoksjon.ee.
The auction for Liivi 2 sea area takes place from 7 December 2023 at 12:00 (CET+2) to 13 December 2023 at 12:00 (CET+2), Estonian time.
The auction for Liivi 1 sea area takes place from 11 January 2024 at 12:00 (CET+2) to 17 January 2024 at 12:00 (CET+2), Estonian time.
Both auctions have an extended end, with the period of extended end being 15 minutes.
Liivi 1 and Liivi 2 sea areas are located northwest of Ruhnu island in an area suitable for the development of wind energy according to the Estonian maritime spatial plan.
The area of Liivi 1 is 77.7 km2 and its starting price is €1,165,500.
The area of Liivi 2 is 114.9 km2 and its starting price is €1,723,500.
The minimum bid increment is €50,000.
In order to participate in the auction, qualified participants must submit an application for participation in the auction to the CPTRA and pay a deposit of €23,310 for the Liivi 1 area and €34,470 for the Liivi 2 area.
The winners of the auctions are the participants who made the highest bid and paid that amount, and procedures for a superficies licence and environmental impact assessment will commence no later than within 90 days from the announcement of the winner of the auction.
Developers who won the auctions must then present their environmental impact assessment programmes to the CPTRA within 18 months, followed by an environmental impact assessment report 24 months after the environmental impact assessment programme has been declared to meet the requirements.
Kristi Talving, director general of CPTRA, said: “We are happy to see that there is a lot of interest in developing offshore wind farms.
“Now that all developers are qualified to participate in the auctions, we can start carried them out. We wish the participants much success.”