Bornholmers set to benefit from new energy island’s green power

The people of Bornholm will be able to benefit from the green electricity from Bornholm Energy Island, Danish TSO Energinet has reported from new analysis.

While the aim from the outset was that the people in Bornholm would be able to benefit from electricity generated from the future offshore wind turbines in the Baltic Sea via the energy island, there were technical concerns but the analysis has found these can be overcome without compromising the security of supply.

For this Energinet has had to develop a new approach, which has now been submitted to the Minister for Climate, Energy and Utilities as part of a business proposal for the initiative for approval.

“It has not been done before that a small consumption area has been connected to a large production unit such as Bornholm Energy Island,” explains Kim Søgaard Mikkelsen, Energinet’s project manager for the Energy Island.

“We have therefore developed a new technical solution to ensure that we do not overload the electricity grid, so that Bornholm continues to have power in the sockets.”

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Today, the island of Bornholm is connected to the Zealand electricity grid via a submarine cable to Sweden.

In order to maintain security of supply, Energinet maintains a power plant on Bornholm to be ready to produce power in the event of a break or fault in the submarine cable. With connection of the Bornholm electricity grid to the energy island, those costs can be saved, expected to amount to DKK1 billion (US$146 million) over 40 years.

The analysis also shows that Bornholmers would get relatively stable electricity prices by connecting to the energy island, and that there is room for additional green electricity production.

Hanne Storm Edlefsen, director of Mega Projects Development at Energinet, adds: “We can understand that the people of Bornholm want to reap the benefits that the energy island brings. Therefore, I am pleased that our analysis shows that it is actually technically possible and is also a good solution if we look at it from a purely socio-economic point of view.”

Bornholm Energy Island is being established to exploit the expected 3GW of offshore wind to be developed in the Baltic Sea to its south.

The power from the wind turbines would be collected and converted into DC in a converter station on Bornholm for onward transmission via cables northwest to Zealand and southwest to Germany initially and potentially elsewhere in the future.

Energinet is developing the project and is collaborating with German TSO 50Hertz on the Denmark-Germany interconnection via Bornholm Energy Island.