The third North Sea Summit will take place on January 26. This year’s event is being hosted by the German government, which is inviting guests to Hamburg City Hall.
At the invitation of Federal Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Federal Minister Katherina Reiche, heads of state and government as well as energy ministers from ten countries will come together. Important decisions on closer cooperation in the expansion of offshore wind energy are to be made at the summit. According to the German government, a joint expansion is key to “strengthening Europe’s energy security and competitiveness, restoring investment and planning security for the offshore wind industry and reducing electricity prices”.
Representatives from Belgium, Denmark, France, Great Britain, Ireland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, the European Commission and, for the first time, Iceland and NATO have been invited. Over 100 company representatives are also expected to attend the summit.
“We are all united by the goal of developing the North Sea into the world’s largest reservoir for clean energy,” says German Chancellor Friedrich Merz. This is of central importance for an economically strong, secure and independent Europe. According to the Chancellor, we want to set the course to enable cross-border energy production and transportation. Cooperation in the entire North Sea region is a decisive building block for this because it allows the countries to grow together into a strong energy network.
As announced by the German government, results are expected at the summit – both intergovernmental summit declarations at various levels and agreements with North Sea states on cooperation projects. An agreement with industry is also planned.
The North Sea as Europe’s “green power plant”
The North Sea Summit was first held in the port city of Esbjerg in 2022 at the initiative of Denmark. The aim of the summit was to strengthen cooperation between the North Sea countries in the expansion of wind energy at sea in order to reduce their joint dependence on fossil fuel imports from Russia in light of the war of aggression against Ukraine.
In 2023, the second North Sea Summit took place in Ostend, Belgium, with the Esbjerg states (Germany, Denmark, Belgium and the Netherlands) as well as Norway, France, Luxembourg, the United Kingdom and Ireland taking part. At this summit, the participating countries decided to develop the North Sea into a “green power plant for Europe” and to jointly install up to 300 gigawatts of power in the North Sea by 2050.
According to the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy, the third North Sea Summit in Hamburg is now intended to advance the implementation of this joint goal and is being held under the motto “From National to Regional”.
The key topics include
- the creation of suitable investment conditions for offshore wind energy,
- cross-border planning and financing of offshore wind farms and the associated electricity grids
- and the protection of critical infrastructure.
The aim is to increase synergy effects in the use of land, strengthen European electricity trading and ensure better utilization of the grid infrastructure. This is to be achieved through the planning and implementation of offshore wind farms with electricity connections to more than one country as well as the connection of offshore wind farms from the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of other countries – so-called cooperation projects.
“Only through offshore cooperation projects can we leverage the full energy potential of the North Sea in an economically efficient manner. In this way, we are making a significant contribution to a stable and affordable energy supply in Europe and thus securing Europe as a business location,” says Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Energy, Katherina Reiche. (AW)
