TRONDHEIM, NORWAY – Wednesday June 16th 2021
The NorthWind research centre on wind energy launched its activities today with its first General Assembly. The centre’s research is divided into five work packages, whose leaders gave short presentations outlining their objectives for the next few years. The centre aims at making wind energy cheaper, more efficient and more sustainable. One of its main areas of focus is offshore wind research.
Centre leader and chief scientist at SINTEF, John Olav Tande, says that large cost reductions are within reach for both bottom-fixed and floating offshore wind energy, but that these cost reductions won’t come automatically.
“The road to success in offshore wind depends on three factors: development, research and innovation. All three have to be present.” NorthWind will guarantee progress on the research and innovation fronts. The development part of the equation received a welcome boost last week, when the Ministry of Petroleum and Energy announced plans to enable the large-scale development of offshore wind.
NorthWind brings together over 50 partners from research institutions and industry all around the world. It is led by the research institute SINTEF, with partners NTNU (Norwegian University of Science and Technology), NINA (The Norwegian Institute for Nature Research), NGI (Norwegian Geotechnical Institute) and UiO (University of Oslo).
Why offshore wind energy?
EIDEL, a Norwegian pioneer in telemetry and secure communication specializing in space and defence markets, signed a letter of intent earlier this year to join Northwind as a user partner, and by this bringing significant contributions to the research centre. Offshore wind energy is rapidly growing, bringing economic growth and at the same time positively impacting to environment by reducing need for fossile energy. By joining Northwind research centre EIDEL will get the opportunity to take part in knowledge sharing with experts from the field and to develop new innovative solutions, hopefully opening doors to new markets.
“I believe offshore wind will be an important part of Europe’s energy source and securing offshore infrastructure against threats will be crucial. With our expertise in data acquisition and secure data links between unmanned assets operating in harsh environments on earth and in space, we bring unique value to the centre.” Says Truls O. Andersen, CEO of EIDEL.
NorthWind is co-financed by its partners and by the Norwegian government through the Norwegian Research Council’s Centres for Environment-friendly Energy Research program. EIDEL has signed a Letter of Intent to join as user partner in the consortium.
You can learn more about the research centre on its new website: www.northwindresearch.no