August 24, 2010
Europe

Estonian government will not support a wind park in the Gulf of Riga

by: Veronica de Castro, Estonian Free Press, www.estonianfreepress.com 24 August 2010

The Estonian Prime Minister Andrus Ansip said that Eesti Energia would not have the approval of the government to set up a wind park in the Gulf of Riga.

The idea of the wind company, as EPL Online published, is to establish 300 wind turbines in 100 square kilometers in the waters near the islands of Kihnu and Ruhnu.

Ansip added that “I presume that there would not be any agreements to this application from the Government next week”.

The Prime Minister stressed that «companies should not be granted special rights in the State waters simply upon a request like that» pointing out that there are two reasons why they do not support the project.

The first one is related with the volume of the territory while the second one is because, in his opinion, Estonia does not need so many wind turbines and so it might not right to reserve sea waters to a private enterprise.

He explained the issue by saying that “It seems that the subsidies level has been set too high; investors are exceedingly interested in wind parks while residents are not so much interested in them”.

Last year, around 65.400 homes in Estonia were powered with the 70 wind turbines that are working in the country.

There are also a lot of wind parks under development, as Tuuliki Kasonen-Lins, the general manager of Estonian Wind Power Association (EWPA), explained to Estonian Free Press.

She also gave us more information that you can read in this article.

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2010/08/24/estonian-government-will-not-support-a-wind-park-in-the-gulf-of-riga/