aventron participates in the Bad Lauchstädt wind farm in Saxony-Anhalt in a joint venture with Terrawatt Planungsgesellschaft mbH. Both companies each hold 50 percent of the plant. The special feature: The clean electricity from the wind farm is mainly used to produce green hydrogen.
The Swiss green power producer aventron has acquired 50 percent of the shares in the new Bad Lauchstädt wind farm. The corresponding contract was signed in Berlin on Friday, 22 September 2023. The wind farm was developed and planned by the Leipzig-based company Terrawatt. It continues to hold a 50 percent stake.
aventron CEO Eric Wagner: "With Terrawatt, we have found the right partner for future-oriented solutions. We are looking forward to working together on the construction and operation of the wind farm, which will also be used to produce green hydrogen. For the further development of this energy park, we want to tackle the challenges for innovative applications with bundled competences."
Falk Zeuner, Managing Director of Terrawatt: "It was important for us to find a competent and innovative partner for the operation of the wind farm in Bad Lauchstädt. With its many years of experience and expertise in wind, solar and battery storage, aventron is ideally suited for this cooperation and the further development steps."
The new wind farm is part of the Bad Lauchstädt energy park. This is located around ten kilometres southwest of the city of Halle in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. It is one of the world's first projects to test how green hydrogen can be produced on a large scale using wind power. The storage, marketing and transport of the hydrogen are also being tested here on an industrial scale. The location is ideally suited for this: salt caverns suitable for possible storage already exist on site, as well as a pipeline network through which the hydrogen can be distributed. The Bad Lauchstädt Energy Park thus serves as a real laboratory for sector coupling and hydrogen production. It is part of the German government's 7th energy research programme and is scientifically supported by the DBI - Gastechnologisches Institut gGmbH Freiberg.
Construction work for the wind farm is already underway and is scheduled for completion in mid-2024. The start of production of the green hydrogen generated with wind power is planned for 2025. The wind farm will consist of eight V162 wind turbines from the Danish manufacturer Vestas. They have a rated output of 6.2 megawatts each and a hub height of up to 169 metres. The diameter of the rotors is 162 metres. The wind farm produces a total of around 135,000 megawatt hours of electricity per year. This is enough to supply 30,000 average households of four people each. This makes the plant the largest in aventron's portfolio. 80 percent of the wind power will be used to produce hydrogen. The rest will be fed into the grid.
The importance of the project has already been underlined by the visit of high-ranking politicians. Among them were the German Minister of Economics, Robert Habeck, and the Minister Presidents of Saxony-Anhalt and Saxony, Reiner Haseloff and Michael Kretschmer. For aventron and Terrawatt, the project offers a great deal of development potential, which both companies would like to expand together. For example, there is the possibility of equipping the wind farm with one or more batteries. These can be used as storage for wind power or for the provision of balancing power.
With its participation in the Bad Lauchstädt wind farm, aventron is not only expanding its portfolio, but also underlining its role as an innovative shaper of the energy transition.