Low Winds Bring Less Offshore Wind Power to German Grid in H1 2021

German offshore wind farms generated 11.49 TWh of electricity in the first half of 2021, some 16.3 per cent less than during the same time last year, when offshore wind turbines off the country’s coasts produced 13.73 TWh of electricity.

The wind energy transmitted from the German North Sea to shore by the transmission system operator TenneT amounted to 9.673 TWh, around 16 per cent less that in the first half of 2020 (11.51 TWh), while wind farms in the Baltic Sea, where the offshore grid is operated by 50Hertz, fed 1.819 TWh into the German grid, 17.5 per cent less than in the first half of 2020 (2.205 TWh).

“The decline in offshore wind energy fed into the German grid is purely weather-related”, said TenneT COO Tim Meyerjürgens. “There was simply less wind on the German North Sea in the first half of 2021 than in the first half of 2020”.

With low winds, German onshore wind output also saw drop in production in the first half of the year, which fell by almost 22 per cent, from around 60 TWh to around 47 TWh.

However, in terms of the share of North Sea electricity in total wind power generation in Germany, it rose to 16.63 percent from 15.6 per cent in the same period last year, according to TenneT.

“Especially in years with less wind, the ratio of wind energy generated shifts towards offshore. There we generate on average about twice as many full-load hours as onshore and can thus partially compensate for lulls onshore. This shows the importance of the further expansion of offshore wind energy for security of supply and for a successful energy transition”, TenneT’s Tim Meyerjürgens said.

In the German North Sea, the capacity expansion of offshore wind farms is stagnating, with the capacity remaining unchanged at 6,679 MW since 2020, TenneT noted.