COP27: Nine New Countries Sign Up for Global Offshore Wind Alliance at Sharm-El-Sheikh

The Global Offshore Wind Alliance (GOWA), initiated by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), Denmark and the Global Wind Energy Council, has the ambition of creating a global driving force for the uptake of offshore wind through political mobilisation and the creation of a global community of practice.

GOWA aims to achieve a total global offshore wind capacity of a minimum of 380 GW by 2030, with 35 GW on average each year across the 2020s and a minimum of 70 GW each year from 2030, culminating in 2,000 GW by 2050. GOWA’s vision is a world in which offshore wind contributes significantly to the energy transition and achieving sustainable development goals through large-scale renewable power generation, benefiting regions, countries and critical sectors such as industry and transportation.

At the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP27, in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, nine new countries, including Belgium, Colombia, Germany, Ireland, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, the UK, and the US, join The Global Offshore Wind Alliance (GOWA), pledging to a rapid ramp up of offshore wind to tackle the climate and energy security crises.

The global alliance will play a major role in transforming targets into action, closing the renewable energy implementation gap while tackling economic, energy security and climate challenges. The countries joining GOWA have agreed to work together to drive national, regional, and global ambitions and remove barriers to the deployment of offshore wind in new and existing markets.

Offshore wind can be deployed at a large scale, in short timeframes and at a competitive cost – it is a fast and viable route to closing the growing gap between renewable energy targets and current implementation rates.

Both the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) and the International Energy Agency (IEA) expect offshore wind capacity to exceed 2000GW in 2050, from just over 60GW today, to limit global temperature rises to 1.5 degrees and achieve net zero. To reach this target, GOWA will aim to contribute to accelerating growth to reach
a total of at least 380GW installed capacity by the end of 2030.

Ben Backwell, CEO of Global Wind Energy Council, said, “There is a large and growing gap between what is needed to reach our climate targets and what is actually happening in terms of implementation. Offshore wind is the most practical technology available for many countries to close this gap. But the situation is not hopeless. GWEC estimates that the current announced government targets for offshore wind would take installed capacity to 370GW – close to the 380GW target – by the end of 2030. But we are going to have to give our best efforts and work together if we are going to turn these targets into reality.”

Jonathan Cole, CEO of global specialist offshore wind developer Corio Generation said: “Thanks to astonishing technological innovation and dramatic cost reductions over the past decade, offshore wind is not only viable, but it is also a compelling source of clean, reliable and affordable energy for most countries with a coastline. The Global Offshore Wind Alliance is a hugely welcome initiative that can help decision-makers share lessons learned on what works and what doesn’t when trying to incubate, incentivise and industrialise a domestic offshore wind sector.”

To benefit from the substantial potential and opportunities deriving from offshore wind, it is pivotal that governments, private sector actors, international organisations and other relevant stakeholders work together to remove the barriers to scaling up investment and finance.