Taiwanese utility Swancor Renewable Energy has teamed up with Japanese counterpart Shizen Energy to develop wind farms off Kyushu, the south-westernmost of Japan’s main islands.
The two companies have not confirmed how much capacity they are aiming to develop, and whether they plan on using floating platforms or fixed-bottom foundations.
However, the partners have explained that they will need to take into account the impact of “geologically challenging” waters and typhoons off Japan – a weather system Swancor has experienced in Taiwan.
Swancor helped to develop the 8MW Formosa 1 (pilot phase) Formosa 1 (pilot phase) (8MW) OffshoreTaiwan, Asia-Pacific Click to see full details and 120MW Formosa 1 Phase 2 Formosa 1 Phase 2 (120MW) Offshoreoff Miaoli, Taiwan, Asia-Pacific Click to see full details projects off Taiwan, the country’s only operating offshore wind capacity to date.
Meanwhile, Shizen Energy has developed about 1GW of renewable energy capacity in Japan, including onshore wind. It is also developing a separate commercial-scale floating wind farm off Kyushu with French foundation specialist Ideol, and 600MW of offshore wind capacity using fixed-bottom foundations with Canadian renewable energy developer Northland Power off Japan’s main island of Honshu.
Japan aims to have renewable sources account for 36-38% of its electricity generation by 2030, and have 10GW of offshore wind capacity by then. It has just over 4.4GW, according to Windpower Intelligence, the research and data division of Windpower Monthly.
The Japanese government also has a target to install 45GW of offshore wind power by 2040. Although Japan has no large-scale offshore wind farms currently in operation, it has a multi-gigawatt pipeline of planned projects announced by established players from Europe and the Americas and sector newcomers from Asia Pacific.
