Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) yesterday signed a preferred bidder agreement with Dutch dredging and heavylift company Royal Boskalis Westminster NV and local marine construction company Hwa chi Construction Co (樺棋營造) to facilitate its wind farm projects off the coast of Changhua County.
Royal Boskalis offshore energy division director Marcel van Bergen said at the signing ceremony that the Papendrecht, Netherlands-headquartered company has set up a joint venture with Hwa chi, in which the latter has a 51 percent stake and Royal Boskalis the remaining 49 percent, to undertake the transport and installation of submarine foundations for CIP’s Chang Fang (彰芳) and Xidao (西島) projects.
Royal Boskalis also plans to extend its roots in Taiwan’s emerging wind industry in the next five to 10 years, Bergen said, adding that the company has started reaching out to more local firms in the supply chain.
Construction is to be completed by the end of 2023 and the two wind farms would have a combined capacity of 600 megawatts, CIP said.
CIP said it is further looking to localize the supply chain for another 100 megawatts in wind power capacity.
“In 2021, there is no requirement to localize these contracts, so we are doing this beyond our requirements,” CIP Taiwan project office chief executive officer Jesper Krarup Holst told reporters on the sidelines of the signing ceremony.
“We are also progressing on all the other fronts, on the turbine localization, on the onshore work localization,” Holst added.
“We can say that there are areas where Taiwanese contractors are not yet completely there and we have seen in the past that the government has allowed some developers to procure partially from Taiwan and partially from international companies,” he said as he expressed the company’s desire for the authorities to allow CIP to make overseas purchases to ensure that the projects are completed on time.
Holst provided the example of an underwater communications cable, which needs to comply with strict manufacturing guidelines as it can easily break.
CIP Taiwan project office director Marina Hsu (許乃文) said that the company would need more freedom to sign overseas contracts to ensure the profitability of its projects.
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