Norway's Equinor plans to build the first offshore floating solar power station

    Equinor, an offshore wind power giant from Norway, recently revealed that it will cooperate with Moss Maritime to explore opportunities for offshore Home Solar Energy System solar power generation, and plans to conduct tests on Frøya Island.

    "If we succeed here, we can succeed anywhere," said Hanne Wigum, head of wind and solar business in Equinor's technology department.

    According to the plan, Equinor will build a floating solar pilot power station near Frøya at the end of the summer of 2021. This will also be the world's first floating solar power station built on sea water.

    The Frøya government has always taken a positive attitude towards the pilot project and has participated in it. At present, Equinor has submitted an application to the Norwegian Water and Energy Agency. The planned area is 80 m x 80 m, and the power station will be tested for at least one year. The project is a collaboration between Equinor and the technology company Moss Maritime.

    According to Equinor, the purpose of the pilot is not to see how much electricity it can generate, but to observe how weather conditions affect the power station. In terms of oil, natural gas and wind energy, the Norwegian coast and continental shelf are world-class geographic locations, but in terms of solar energy, other regions obviously offer better conditions. As a test area, Frøya is still very suitable.

    The power station will also be an important milestone for Moss Maritime. "In the past three years, we have been studying this concept. The most recent time was through the cooperation with Equinor. The concept has been quite mature technically and economically." Alexander Thøgersen, vice president of engineering at Moss Maritime said: "Floating pilot power station It will be an important step towards the commercialization of the technology and an important means to further develop and optimize the concept."

    It is reported that this is the third research project on floating solar power plants that Equinor has participated in. The remaining two are located in Sri Lanka and the Netherlands. All three are located in different water surface environments in order to test the elasticity and predictability of power generation under different environmental conditions.