Chinese money for Karelian wind power

Green power was a key issue of discussion during last week’s Karelian government visit to the Chinese province of Fujian. A 60 MW wind park is planned built offshore in the White Sea. It has an estimated price of 9 billion rubles, and is considered one of the most perspective investment projects in Karelia, the regional government informs.

It could become Russia’s first offshore wind park.

According to regional Deputy Governor Vladimir Timofeev, this is what the Chinese want.

«We have agreed to develop the wind power project - this is what the Chinese are most interested in,» Timofeev says to TASS.

A Chinese delegation with technical experts is due to come to the northwest Russian region in May, and official documents are expected to be formalized during that visit. The specialists will review the project including technical aspects of the offshore location, the deputy governor says.

Both Rosatom, the state nuclear power company, and the Russian Fund for Direct Investments are likely partners in the project. But is it the Chinese side which is talking on the full responsibility for project preparations.

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The White Sea wind project came on the Russian-Chinese agenda as part of a cooperation deal signed in November 2016 by former Karelian Governor Aleksandr Khudilainen and Vice President of Chinese energy company Sinomec Li Yan.

«The development of this project will not only improve the energy situation, it will also create jobs and promote the image of the republic», said regional leader Khudilainen. 

The Republic of Karelia is today dependent of its hydro power generation and energy imports from the neighboring regions of Murmansk and Leningrad Oblast.

The Chinese company Sinomec is from before investing in the development of a new hydropower station in Karelia. The company is one of the stakeholders in the Beloporozhsky project, the first investment object in Russia of BRICS investment body New Development Bank.