The ‘Sunny-South-East’ along the County Wexford shoreline is set for a major boost economically, environmentally and visually. In early 2020, XELLZ secured approximately 200,000 sq.m of land at Rosslare Europort. XELLZ has now divided the area of ground into zones and the entire area will be known as Rosslare Europort Business Park (EBP). Through its offshore services subsidiary 24shore and XELLZ Ireland, the Dutch company will establish an offshore wind supply base there to serve and support future offshore wind farms, bringing new energy to the region.
The EBP area has been divided into five different zones which are all situated alongside the new planned access road to the Port. The land adjoins the port area, with direct access to the quay, and will be used for offshore supply base operations including pre-installation assembly and mobilisation.
“This announcement marks the real beginning for this development to serve the future offshore wind farms in the Irish and Celtic Sea. EBP’s land gives direct access to the quay for loading and offloading of offshore wind equipment, and we are now ready to talk to interested parties.” said Petrus (Peter) Bouwhuis, CEO of XELLZ B.V.
The Europort Business Park will become a hive of activity where businesses directly related to the upcoming Offshore Wind Farms (OWF’s) can establish themselves. The space offers ample storage and assembly areas to manage the wind turbines, transition pieces and mobilisation equipment. For the future, there is also space available for small to medium enterprises (SME’s) interested in providing maintenance, operational, and repair services to this budding renewable energy market.
The Port of Rosslare will be ready to serve the Irish and the Celtic Sea as well as reaching the UK east coast and continental Europe where many OWF’s are planned.
The Irish Government has set out the State’s clear commitment to reduce carbon emissions with offshore wind expected to play a part. In July 2019 it adopted a Climate Action Plan which specifies, a plan for renewables to provide 70% of electricity generation by 2030. Offshore wind is expected to deliver at least 3.5 GW in support of reaching this target.
At the beginning of December 2019 the Department of Communications, Climate Action & Environment announced details of the first Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (RESS) auction, which has received Government approval. The RESS is an auction-based scheme which invites renewable electricity projects to bid for capacity and receive a guaranteed price for the electricity they generate. Subject to state aid approval, the first auction is set to open this year.
Through its offshore services subsidiary 24shore, XELLZ offers a number of services to the offshore energy sector including project logistics management, property, personnel and vessel chartering services.