When the Fédéral Maritime and Hydrographie Agency of Germany
issued its approval to Offshore Butendiek GmbH based in Husum
before Christmas 2002, the founding shareholders imagined they
were very close to achieving their goal. "We want to start construction of the wind farm in 200A/2005 and to generate electricity with it by 2006 at the latest", they wrote at the time to their
limited partners.
But Germany is not Denmark; that became ever clearer to the
Butendiek pioneers with every month that passed after the
approval. The difficultés mounted. Banks gave them the cold
shoulder. The time was simply not yet ripe in Germany for wind
power utilisation at sea. No bank wanted to provide millions for a
risky technology that was to be managed by a collective - which
was seen as making things harder by the financial institutions
- and not by financially strong energy companies. The fact that
the Renewable Energies Act then in force provided for a mere 9.1
cents per kilowatt hour for wind power at sea was seen as too
low in banking circles. And finally the Butendiekers search for a
general contractor to réalisé the construction of the wind farm at
sea, also remained fruitless. This was aggravated by the fact that
plans for mains supply and connection to the high-voltage grid
on land had made no progress whateverforyears as the intended
path of the power cables through Sylt was locally contentious on
the island.
The dream of a cooperative wind farm at sea was evaporating by
the minute. When the Butendiek crew then ran out of money, they
decided at the end of 2006 to enter a "strategie partnership" with
the company Airtricity, based in Dublin. The Irish, who operated
several wind farms on land in USA, Ireland, Northern Ireland and
Scotland, had also gained their first expérience at sea. They had
managed the planning and construction of the small offshore
wind farm at Arklow Bank in the Irish Sea. As well as taking over
the project rights, Airtricity agreed with the Butendiekers to finq
issued its approval to Offshore Butendiek GmbH based in Husum
before Christmas 2002, the founding shareholders imagined they
were very close to achieving their goal. "We want to start construction of the wind farm in 200A/2005 and to generate electricity with it by 2006 at the latest", they wrote at the time to their
limited partners.
But Germany is not Denmark; that became ever clearer to the
Butendiek pioneers with every month that passed after the
approval. The difficultés mounted. Banks gave them the cold
shoulder. The time was simply not yet ripe in Germany for wind
power utilisation at sea. No bank wanted to provide millions for a
risky technology that was to be managed by a collective - which
was seen as making things harder by the financial institutions
- and not by financially strong energy companies. The fact that
the Renewable Energies Act then in force provided for a mere 9.1
cents per kilowatt hour for wind power at sea was seen as too
low in banking circles. And finally the Butendiekers search for a
general contractor to réalisé the construction of the wind farm at
sea, also remained fruitless. This was aggravated by the fact that
plans for mains supply and connection to the high-voltage grid
on land had made no progress whateverforyears as the intended
path of the power cables through Sylt was locally contentious on
the island.
The dream of a cooperative wind farm at sea was evaporating by
the minute. When the Butendiek crew then ran out of money, they
decided at the end of 2006 to enter a "strategie partnership" with
the company Airtricity, based in Dublin. The Irish, who operated
several wind farms on land in USA, Ireland, Northern Ireland and
Scotland, had also gained their first expérience at sea. They had
managed the planning and construction of the small offshore
wind farm at Arklow Bank in the Irish Sea. As well as taking over
the project rights, Airtricity agreed with the Butendiekers to finq