'Central for offshore wind' | German TSOs apply speedy permitting for first HVDC line

TenneT and 50Hertz to use accelerated permitting enabled in new legislation allowing for faster procedures on basis of ‘overriding public interest’

Bernd Radowitz

German transmission system operators TenneT and 50Hertz are using a recently created option for an accelerated permitting procedure to build a new cross-country high voltage direct current (HVDC) power line that they say will be key to feed more offshore wind power into the grid.

The NordOstLink will transport electricity from the North Sea coast at Heide in Schleswig-Holstein state to close to Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania’s state capital of Schwerin in north-eastern Germany (a distance of 160km as the crow flies), where it can be linked to southern German industrial centres via another HVDC line currently being developed, the SuedOstLink.

The speedy permitting has been made possible through a new 'law for a restart of digitalisation in the energy transition', which has just been passed by Germany’s parliament. The legislation follows up on emergency regulation passed in the EU late last year that allows to push through renewables and grid expansion projects faster by giving them the status of ‘overriding public interest’.

“The direct current underground cable connection NordOstLink is central to the integration of the enormous offshore wind power potential of the North Sea into the German transmission grid,” 50Hertz CEO Stefan Kapferer said.

“Together with our partner TenneT, we have therefore decided to use the acceleration potential of the new legal regulations.

“NordOstLink is thus becoming an important pilot project. The energy transition needs more speed, so now it's time to tackle things together and find pragmatic solutions.”

Germany’s ambitious wind power expansion plans in recent years had been throttled because of insufficient HVDC lines linking power from its vast offshore and onshore wind capacity in the North to population and industry centres to the South.

Previous measures to speed up the grid expansion have not had the intended effect. Three major North-South HVDC lines that should already be up and running for years have been held up by not-in-my-backyard (Nimby) protests and an avalanche of court cases against them – this despite a decision by a previous government to lay almost all HVDC cables underground.

TenneT and 50Hertz said they will also build an ‘electricity turnstile’ at NordOstLink’s starting point that for the first time will make it possible to connect direct current lines to other HVDC cables, which the TSOs reckon is an entry into a meshed DC network that will enable electricity to be transported efficiently over long distances.

“Rapid grid expansion is absolutely necessary in order to achieve the climate goals of the federal government,” TenneT chief operating officer Tim Meyerjürgens said.

“That's why NordOstLink should be transporting green electricity from the North Sea coast of Schleswig-Holstein to Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania as early as 2032 and … supply five million households with electricity.”

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