The development of offshore wind power in France has encountered setbacks. Recently, the bidding for the 1GW "Centre Manche 1" offshore wind power project planned to be built in the English Channel failed and no bidding proposals were received. This is the second large-scale offshore wind power project in the country to fail in the past six months.

The project was originally planned to be installed 35 kilometers off the Normandy coast at a depth of approximately 40 meters. The French Energy Regulatory Commission (CRE) has confirmed that this tender "did not produce any eligible bidding proposals" and stated that it is analyzing the specific reasons.

Industry analysis suggests that the failure of bidding is mainly due to overly strict bidding terms: requiring developers to independently undertake grid connected projects, significantly increasing cost risks; Mandatory full assumption of market negative electricity price losses; At the same time, it is required that 40% of the fan components must be produced locally in France. These conditions bring enormous pressure to developers.

In December last year, the 500MW "South Brittany" project in France also ended with zero bids. Faced with consecutive unsuccessful bids, the French government promised to re evaluate the bidding terms. The Minister of Energy stated that additional subsidies would be provided for the "South Brittany" project and considered re bidding in 2025.

This benchmark poses a new challenge to France's offshore wind power targets. According to the national energy plan, France aims to deploy 18GW of offshore wind power installed capacity by 2035 and 4.4GW by mid-2030. Continuous project milestones have made the path to achieving these goals even more difficult. Editor/Yang Beihua