Presentations
Estimating Decommissioning Costs of Future Dutch Offshore Wind Farms to Update Tenders’ End-of-Life Provisions
Harald van der Mijle Meijer, Senior Consultant Wind Energy Technology, TNO - Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research
Abstract
"The Dutch Ministry of Climate and Green Growth (KGG) commissioned TNO to reassess offshore wind farm decommissioning costs to support a potential update of the decommissioning bank guarantee requirements used in Dutch Wind Farm Site Decisions. The current guarantee value, introduced in 2016, is fixed at 120k€ per installed MW and is increasingly considered misaligned with realistic end-of-life costs for future offshore wind farms. This study uses high-fidelity offshore wind simulation software (UWiSE) to estimate removal and transport costs for the main offshore wind farm subsystems (e.g., turbines, foundations, inter-array cables, and scour protection). Rather than assuming a single, fixed decommissioning scenario, multiple subsystem-level removal campaigns are modelled to reflect uncertainty in future regulatory requirements, technology development, and weather-driven offshore operations. The case study focuses on a representative future Dutch offshore wind farm aligned with the Offshore Wind Roadmap 21 GW, providing cost ranges and risk-aware insights instead of single deterministic outcomes. The results [1] support policymakers moving from a generic €/MW guarantee towards more robust and transparent bank guarantee provisions that better reflect expected end-of-life liabilities. [1] Mancini S, Bloothoofd J. Offshore Wind Farm Decommissioning Cost Estimates - Simulating removal and transport of the subsystems of a hypothetical offshore wind farm site representative for the Dutch Roadmap 21GW. 2025. https://publications.tno.nl/publication/34645671/IokAEuCy/TNO-2025-R11554.pdf "
