Engineering firm Technip Energies (PARIS: TE) has acquired a 16.3% stake in Spanish renewable energy start-up X1 Wind.
The Barcelona-based company has pioneered the design of an “innovative and disruption” offshore wind turbine floating design with “major environmental and operational benefits”.
Technip Energies is the lead investor in the funding round, which also involves the European Commission-owned European Innovation Council (EIC) Fund, as well as established shareholders.
Under the terms of the agreement, Technip Energies will hold two of the nine seats on X1 Wind’s board of directors.
The French firm, a spinout of TechnipFMC, will also support X1 Wind’s management through its participation in joint technical and commercialisation committees.
It will also bring its own engineering capabilities, offshore project execution and industrialisation skills to progress the concept to commercial application.
Willy Gauttier, Technip Energies Vice President for Floating Offshore Wind, commented: “With this investment and collaboration, Technip Energies demonstrates that it is not only addressing today’s floating offshore wind market with its current semi-submersible technology, it is also preparing the future with this promising design to become the leader of the next generation of floaters.
“Thanks to our offshore project execution and experience in developing technical concepts all the way to commercialisation, we are confident that X1 Wind will be a great addition to Technip Energies’ portfolio of technology solutions in the near future.”
X1 Wind FOW concept
The X1 Wind FOW concept is based on a Tension Leg Platform (TLP) mooring, with a weathervaning system and a downwind turbine.
The design allows for a lighter floater design with a significantly reduced steel requirement and for a more efficient and restricted mooring system, minimising the impact on seabed.
It is scalable for turbines of over 15 megawatts (MW), facilitating cost effective deployment for large-scale offshore wind farms.
Technip Energies and X1 Wind will collaborate on the development of the first commercial-scale demonstrator, as well as the related industrialisation and commercialisation plans of the technology.
Alex Raventos, co-founder and chief executive of X1 Wind, said: “Our innovation capacity and disruptive light-weight technology, coupled with Technip Energies’ decades of experience in the offshore sector and proven track-record implementing the first floating wind projects, brings a perfect alliance to develop the next generation of floating wind technology, necessary to lower the costs of the floating wind sector to meet the ambitious targets and contribute to a carbon neutral but competitive energy mix.”
ScotWind
Alongside Magnora, TechnipFMC paid more than £10 million to secure seabed rights through the ScotWind leasing round.
The pair plan to construct a 500 MW floating offshore wind farm off the Western Isles that will be capable of suppling green energy to more than 600,000 homes.
The development will cover an area of about 38 square miles in water depths of 106 to 125 meters.
