Estonia Sets Auction Date for Two Offshore Wind Areas

November 8, 2023, by Adnan Memija

Estonia’s Consumer Protection and Technical Regulation Authority (CPTRA) announced on 7 November that two online auctions will be held for the development of offshore wind farms in the Liivi 1 and Liivi 2 sea areas.

The auction for Liivi 2 sea area will take place from 7 December to 13 December while the auction for Liivi 1 will be launched from 11 January 2024 to 17 January 2024. Both auctions have extended end, with the period of extended end being 15 minutes.

According to CPTRA, it received competing applications for a superficies license from seven qualified companies and those are OÜ Utilitas Wind, Liivi Offshore OÜ, Aker Offshore Wind Europe GmbH, VIRU KEEMIA GRUPP AS, Sunly Wind OÜ, Edel Offshore Wind OÜ, and UAB Ignitis Renewables Projektai 6.

“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,” said Kristi Talving, Director General of the Consumer Protection and Technical Regulation Authority.

Liivi 1 and Liivi 2 sea areas are located northwest of Ruhnu Island in an area suitable for the development of offshore wind farms according to the Estonian maritime spatial plan.

The Liivi 1 area is 77.7 square kilometres and its starting price is approximately EUR 1.16 million while the Liivi 2 area (114.9 square kilometres) has a starting price of about EUR 1.72 million.

The minimum bid increment is EUR 50,000.

To participate in the auction, qualified participants must submit an application for participation in the auction to the CPTRA and pay a deposit of EUR 23,310 for the Liivi 1 area and EUR 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 (EIA) will commence no later than within 90 days from the announcement of the winner of the auction, according to CPTRA.

Developers who won the auctions must then present their EIA programmes to the CPTRA within 18 months, said CPTRA, followed by an EIA report 24 months after the EIA programme has been declared to meet the requirements.