India Approves Offshore Wind Pact with Denmark

India’s Union Cabinet has given its approval for a cooperation agreement between India and Denmark on strategic sector cooperation in the field of renewable energy with a focus on offshore wind.

The Cabinet has also approved a Letter of Intent to establish an Indo-Danish Centre of Excellence for renewable energy in India.

The areas of cooperation would include technical capacity building for management of off­shore wind projects, measures to develop and sustain a highly efficient wind industry, onshore as well as offshore; measures to ‘ensure high quality of wind turbines, components, and certification requirements; forecasting and scheduling of offshore wind projects.

The Indo-Danish Centre of Excellence in Integrated Renewable Power would work on renewable energy resource assessments with a focus on onshore and offshore wind; hybridisation of wind, solar, hydro and storage technologies; integration of renewable energy inch high level of wind energy, testing and R&D; and skill development/capacity building.

India has established a goal of having 5GW of operating offshore wind capacity by 2022 and as much as 30GW by 2030.

An expression of interest for the country’s inaugural offshore wind park near Gujarat, issued in April 2018, attracted 35 responses from both domestic and international companies and consortia.

The Indian government plans to launch the leasing of 1GW of prospective capacity off Gujarat later this year.