The Danish state should be a co-owner of future offshore wind farms similar to what has been the case with oil extraction in the North Sea, for instance, writes Minister for Climate, Energy and Utilities Lars Aagard in a reply to Børsen after the business daily has learned from several sources that the government is attempting to establish state co-ownership of future wind production.

”Our starting point is to set off from a model with state co-ownership in combination with concession payment,” writes Aagaard.

”State co-ownership, a model we know well from the North Sea, for instance, partakes in ensuring more state insight into important infrastructure – furtermore, society is ensured a part of the profit by utilizing Danish ocean areas, which represent a common good.”

In his reply, the minister does not give any details as to how big a stake the state ownership should represent.

According to Børsen’s sources, the government has proposed founding a state company that will be signed on as a joint owner of offshore wind turbines.

The plan is to establish state ownership of 25% through so-called Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) companies, reports Børsen.

These are thus meant to own a fourth of the 6GW offshore wind farms that are set for installation in the coming years.

Nine countries – including Denmark – agreed in April to double the North Sea offshore wind capacity.

The new target entails offshore wind installations of 130GW by 2030 – and 300GW by 2050.

That represents a doubling compared to what Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium agreed on at the North Sea summit in Esbjerg last year.