After years of no progress under the former right-wing PiS government, offshore wind power is now underway in Poland. Three new projects were auctioned off by the government in December, aiming at adding 3.4 gigawatts of electricity generation in the Baltic Sea.
The bidding was mostly done using public money, with the options for outsiders limited. Of the three new projects, state-owned Orlen has been given the rights to develop Baltic East, a wind farm of 900 megawatts (MW). State-owned PGE gets Baltica 9, a 975-MW wind farm, and a joint-venture of private Polish firm Polenergia and Norway’s Equinor is allowed to develop Baltyk I with 1,56 GW of power.
Almost 43% of Polenergia is owned by Mansa Investments, which is controlled by Polish businesswoman Dominika Kulczyk through Kulczyk Holding. Dominika is the daughter of Jan Kylczyk, who started the holding and became the richest man in Poland until his death in 2015.
Contract of Difference
Offshore wind projects are difficult to get off the ground in many countries, because of the substantially increased costs over the last few years, the Polish government is paying the energy companies a minimum price of about EUR 115 per megawatt hour (MWh) when the sell prices of wind electricity reach that point. This is believed to be a third or double of what other countries pay to energy companies under similar, so-called Contracts for Difference (CfD).
First power in 2026
While the newly auctioned projects are only in their very first phase, the first Polish offshore wind farm should come online at the end of 2026. It is Baltic Power of 1.14 GW with 15-MW-turbines; run by a joint venture of Orlen and Canadian company Northland Power. Baltic 2 & 3 of Polenergia and Equinor are set to deliver first power of its projected 1.44 GW capacity in 2027. | © 2025 Marcel Burger, nordicreporter.com. Featured photo: A wind turbine at sea (AI generated with Adobe Firefly)