Orsted has set up an energy trading office in Chicago, Illinois, which will trade renewables capacity in the Danish developer’s US portfolio.
The new trading expects to start trading power before the end of this month.
Initially, traders will mainly trade power generated by onshore wind farms owned by subsidiary Lincoln Clean Energy, which Orsted acquired in August 2018.
Orsted executive vice president Morten Hultberg Buchgreitz said: “With a trading office in the US, we’ll be able to reduce risks and ensure higher transfer prices on the power generated by our solar and onshore wind farms.”
Today, Lincoln has 1017MW of onshore wind power in operation in the US, 441MW under construction and 1.5GW in the pipeline.
The US power markets are complex, and according to Orsted being “present” and having “in-depth knowledge” of the markets to secure good power price agreements offer “great advantages”.
Hultberg Buchgreitz said: “Our European trading office has competences and volumes that we can transfer to the US markets.
“And by setting up an office in Chicago, we can also hire employees who have in-depth knowledge of the US power markets.”