Mundus Nordic Green News – 28 January, 2021

Huge interest in Akers renewable financing round

Yesterday, Nordic Green reported on Aker Horizon’s corporate moves. On Wednesday, the company announced that it had raised NOK 4.4 billion from new investors. According to a stock exchange announcement from Aker, the issue was "oversubscribed several times". The plan is for Aker Horizons to be listed on a secondary list of the Oslo Stock Exchange (formerly known as Merkur Market) on Monday. The plan is to move to the main list within 12 months. According to the announcements, Folketrygdfondet and fund managers in DNB, Handelsbanken and Swedbank will enter and subscribe for shares in the issue.

 

According to Norway’s Dagens Naeringsliv, the Rokke family has created a venture worth NOK 20 billion through the corporate processes in just half a year.

 

Volvo Group forms a business area with a focus on accelerating electrification

Volvo Energy will be a business area with full responsibility for results. It will have an internal role where it provides batteries and charging solutions to the Group's other business areas and an external role where it offers used, refurbished batteries to customers for various areas of use. Volvo Energy will also have group responsibility for hydrogen infrastructure solutions for fuel cell electric vehicles. Collaborations with various partners and actors in the ecosystem will be a central part of the business. The new business area will be led by Joachim Rosenberg, who is a member of Volvo's Group Management

 

Statkraft makes a U-turn, and returns to offshore wind

In 2015, Norway’s state-owned utility, Statkraft announced that it would focus its efforts elsewhere than offshore wind, putting all its offshore energy technology assets up for sale. Now, Statkraft has re-entered Norwegian offshore wind, with developments in the industry having made it more profitable. Statkraft has entered into a cooperation agreement with Aker Offshore Wind and Aker Horizons to explore project opportunities for offshore wind in Norway.

 

Sweden’s Energy Agency releases national strategy for sustainable wind power

The Swedish Energy Agency, Energimyndigheten, released a new strategy for development of wind energy. In a press release, the Agency said that “Sweden has high climate ambitions and a goal of 100% renewable electricity production. Electrification in the transport and industrial sector, together with the fact that Sweden's electricity production facilities are getting older, creates a need to replace or modernize our existing power production. This is an annual electricity production of at least 100 TWh of electricity that needs to be replaced by the 2040s, corresponding to about 70% of today's electricity use. 

 

Since wind power is the electricity production technology that today has the lowest costs, this is where we see that electricity producers invest. But an important issue for a sustainable wind power expansion is that the expansion is distributed in a suitable way across the country, both from an electricity supply perspective and with regard to other land use interests… The strategy is about switching to a long-term sustainable energy system not only for climate reasons but also for increased competitiveness, security of supply and to meet an increasing need for electricity in all parts of the country without unreasonable costs for consumers."

 

With wind developers being very critical of Sweden’s planning approval process the strategy includes a developed planning process for wind power, with regional development needs, proposals for changed municipal approval and a national planning basis that will facilitate and guide the regional work. 

 

Nordic companies outperform in sustainability

On Monday Nordic Green reported that Finland’s Neste took fourth place in Corporate Knights Global 100 of the world's most sustainable companies. A number of other Nordic companies also made the list. Denmark’s Orsted took the #2 position, behind Schnieder Electric of France. In total 14 of the Top 100 were Nordic companies, with 5 from Finland and Denmark, and 2 each from Sweden and Norway.

 

Lundin Energy announces accelerated strategy for reducing CO2 emissions

As part of its capital market day, Lundin Energy announced that it will accelerate its strategy to reduce carbon dioxide emissions to achieve climate neutrality in operational activities as early as 2025, from originally 2030. This advance has been made possible thanks to the electrification of the company's main assets going well and investments being made in renewable energy projects to compensate for electricity consumption.

 

Nordic Hydrogen Partnership is the new Nordic organization for hydrogen

Nordic Hydrogen Partnership (NHP) is the new Nordic hydrogen organization, with a name change symbolizing both the rapidly growing role that hydrogen plays in the Nordic energy system, as well as the partnership's desire to expand the use of hydrogen and electrofuels throughout the Nordic region.

 

The name change is also the result of the intensified and expanded cooperation between the national Nordic organizations for hydrogen, namely the Norwegian Hydrogen Forum, Vätgas Sweden, Icelandic New Energy, the hydrogen industry and the Finnish VTT, which together make up the members of NHP. The five coalition partners strengthen their cooperation and use their expertise to strengthen the implementation of hydrogen and fuel cell technologies in the Nordic region in close cooperation with a number of representatives of the hydrogen industry.

 

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