Despite a volatile year for offshore wind development in 2023 a record number of offshore wind development zones will be allocated globally in 2024 -2025, driven by national clean energy development targets.
But, in order to realize project timelines, developers and their investor partners increasingly need a fast and reliable means of screening early-stage projects to ensure optimal decision-making in the deployment of capital.
By offering a solution that enables developers to rapidly assess project location, wind resource, project layout – including wake losses - and the best installation sequence, Youwind's technology provides the offshore wind industry with a route to reducing the overall time taken for project site screening by up to 80% - significantly accelerating the project development cycle.
To date, Youwind has been used to analyze over 1000 offshore wind project sites, screening development zones amounting to more than 250TW of potential installed capacity, worldwide.
"2023 was a tumultuous year for global offshore wind, but with Government targets for Net Zero requiring significantly increased volumes of offshore wind generating capacity to become operational between 2030 – 2050, auctions held in the next two years are critical to the next 20 years of development," said Anna Rivera, Chief Executive Officer, Youwind.
"With the possibility that some of these projects will run into permitting and financing challenges later in the development cycle, there is a real imperative to ensure that sites are screened not only as efficiently as possible at this stage, but also at a level that ensures critical future development questions are covered as early as possible."
Developer, Copenhagen Energy, has adopted Youwind to support its screening of offshore wind project sites worldwide.
Speaking on its deployment of the technology, Jasmin Bejdic, Founder & CEO, Copenhagen Energy, said, "Our strategy is to be an early mover in new high potential markets – developing large-scale offshore wind on a global scale. A fundamental part of this is to be able to act fast, make intelligent site selection and screening decisions and then accelerate the development phases to deliver maximum value to local communities and our stakeholders. Youwind is a solution that is fully aligned with our objectives."
Youwind, built by engineers with over 15 years of first-hand experience in developing offshore wind projects, integrates engineering and cost data to efficiently model key technical and financial indicators and assess the viability of projects. The entirely web-based solution offers distinct tools to analyse and optimise each proposed project design, helping to inform the financing and development of projects that meet the financial expectations of investors.
These tools are backed up by a project development database, encompassing everything from wind resource and power curves, through to GIS layers, locational data on neighbouring projects, and all offshore wind equipment and components. As offshore wind projects continue to scale in size, technology, and global territory, Youwind offers a trusted single solution for taking projects rapidly to final investment decision.
