Today the Cabinet has embraced the North Sea Agreement and presented it to the House of Representatives. NWEA chairman Hans Timmers took part in the negotiations on behalf of the wind sector over the last year. Other participants were stakeholders such as the gas companies, NGOs for nature and fishery and the National government. NWEA supports the agreement.

The implementation and affordability are discussed constructively with the Ministry of Economic Affairs & Climate because, from a wind energy perspective,  the goals and affordability of the climate agreement must be served with an affordable energy mix.

Hans Timmers: “Collaboration is necessary, now and later. After all, space is scarce for nature, fishing, shipping and energy, we can only solve that together. From a well-mapped roadmap, we must seize this opportunity with both hands. A healthy balanced North Sea gives us all benefits; fishing, nature and energy go hand-in-hand with preferably multiple use of space. The agreement is a good first step for that.”

NWEA emphasizes the importance of the North Sea to achieve the goals of the climate agreement by 2050. Lots of wind energy is the most important sustainable source for this, in a well-integrated energy system with accompanying infrastructure.

NWEA looks forward to the implementation of the North Sea Agreement and the need to give the North Sea a substantial qualitative boost. So that qualitative benefits for society with healthy nature and sustainable fishing, but also the Climate Agreement, come a step closer. NWEA sees that major steps still need to be taken in the breadth of the energy transition: Electrifying faster in order to bring supply and demand closer to industry as close as possible and to keep the social costs of the transition as low as possible.

The wind sector considers it important to have reached an agreement with all stakeholders and ministries about the transition to a sustainable North Sea and achieving the climate goals. It is therefore good that in addition to the Roadmap 2030 (total 11.5 GW in 2030), a start has also been made on designating areas for wind farms, eventually to a total of 60-70 GW in 2050. Wind will soon be the largest supplier of sustainable electricity by 2030. This requires enormous efforts from the sector, but also from all other stakeholders at sea. Without government incentives, we can make a major contribution to a green energy supply, provided that the enormous demand for and purchase of electricity is realized on time. This is stated in the Climate Agreement and is an important starting point for NWEA.

NWEA would like to thank the participants for the constructive input and cooperation, the government with the OFL, and in particular Jacques Wallage and his staff for the constructively challenging conversations in the past period.