France awards 1GW in latest onshore wind round

The country’s energy transition ministry had initially sought to award power deals for 925MW of onshore wind capacity in the latest auction round. However, developers submitted plans for 85 projects with a combined capacity of 1,564.2MW.

It ultimately awarded power deals to 58 projects with a combined capacity of 1,058.1MW.

The average price across successful projects was €87.80/MWh – on par with the €87.23/MWh average tariff in France’s most recent onshore wind tender. It follows the sector being hit by inflationary pressures in recent years.

Around half of the 1.05GW of newly awarded capacity was allocated in the country’s north-east, with 252MW awarded to 15 projects in the Hauts de France region, and 249MW awarded to eight other projects in the neighbouring Grande Este region. 

These two regions, plus the south-west region of Nouvelle Aquitaine (197MW, nine projects), accounted for two thirds of the total capacity awarded in the tender. 

There were a total of 26 successful bidders and bidding consortia. French renewables investment firm TTR bagged the most capacity with 210.6MW – around 20% of the total awarded.  

A consortium of Germany utility EnBW and its subsidiary Valeco won the second most (117.4MW), followed by a joint venture between Swiss power firm Axpo and German wind operator Volkswind (75.6MW) and German utility RWE (57.3MW) bidding alone. 

French renewables consultancy Envinergy pointed out that those companies – plus Swiss firm Romande – accounted for almost 50% of the total capacity awarded in the tender. 

There were three new winners of onshore wind projects in the tender, including Spanish utility major Iberdrola, electricity firm Dio Energie and German developer Windstrom.