ESB joins forces with Norway’s Equinor to build wind farms

State-owned electricity supplier ESB is joining forces with Norwegian player Equinor to build wind farms off the Irish coast.

The pair said on Thursday that they would work to find suitable sites for new offshore windfarms in Irish waters and possibly seek locations where the electricity they generate can be stored.

ESB and Equinor said that they hoped to have the wind farms operating by 2030, when the Government wants 70 per cent of electricity used in the Republic to be generated from renewable energy such as wind and solar power.

Norway-based Equinor supplies electricity to more than one million European homes from wind farms in Baltic Sean, Britain and Germany.

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The company built the world's first floating wind farm, off the Scottish coast, in 2017 and plans similar projects for other parts of the UK, Norway and Asia.

ESB generation and trading executive director Jim Dollard, maintained the partnership would aid its plan to cut its greenhouse gas emissions.

"Today's announcement represents a significant commitment by ESB in offshore wind in Ireland, " he said.

Equinor senior vice president, Jens O Økland, added that the company was looking forward to working with the ESB in exploring opportunities in Ireland.

State-owned ESB supplies around half the electricity used in the Republic and owns fossil fuel- and wind-powered generating plants around Ireland.