In late January we announced the commissioning of two new wind parks in the Nordics. I could not be happier with the work our teams and contractors did to bring more renewable electricity production capacity to the world. An interesting fact I would like to highlight is that the Kalax project in Närpes, with production of more than 0.3 TWh per year, has the highest annual production of all wind parks commissioned in Finland in 2020.
Growth in renewables has played a crucial role in Fortum’s strategy and it will be important for Fortum in the future, as was communicated in our updated strategy published last December. There’s also a strong demand in our home markets of northern Europe to get more renewable sources of energy into the system. This clean power will help to reach our governments’ and customers’ ambitious climate targets: decarbonisation of societies and industry through electrification.
Wind as a renewable, CO2-free power source is a solution to enable electrification in transportation, industries and heating. Energy production in the Nordics is almost 100% fossil-free, but major steps are still needed in these areas of consumption in order to meet the required targets and the potential additional demand from hydrogen production. Our wind power team has no doubt that we are on an important mission: to create more sustainable ways of producing energy.
In the Nordics, government subsidies are not needed for onshore wind power (which is located on land rather than in large bodies of water). It is an important form of energy in climate change mitigation, as half a year of wind power production can offset the CO2 emissions that were generated during construction.
What’s going on with wind power at Fortum?
Kalax (90 MW) in Närpes, on the western coast of Finland, and Sørfjord (99 MW), in northern Norway, are the newest additions to our family of wind power parks we have constructed and now co-own with our partners. Fortum is also responsible for operation of the parks: we make sure that the wind parks work efficiently throughout their lifecycle.
In Norway, we are in charge of operating three wind parks: Sørfjord (99 MW), Ånstadblåheia (50 MW) and Nygårdsfjellet (32 MW). In Sweden, we currently operate one wind park, Solberg (76 MW). In Finland, we also multiple projects in the development phase, which means that we are actively cooperating with the landowners and other local stakeholders to identify the best solutions for building more wind power. In addition, Fortum – together with our partners – is the largest producer of wind power in Russia.
The future looks bright for our wind team: together with my colleagues here in the Nordics, and now also in Germany and rest of the Europe, we are excited for the expansion of renewables in Europe. Strengthening and growing in CO2-free power generation is one of the priorities of our updated strategy.