EnBW’s Offshore Wind Energy Plant Gains $664 Million Loan From the EIB

The 288-megawatt wind farm will be built in waters 44 meters (144 feet) deep and 32 kilometers (20 miles) north of the island of Ruegen. Energy company EnBW, based in Karlsruhe, also developed Germany’s first commercial wind farm in the Baltic Sea, the EnBW Baltic 1, connected to the grid in May 2011.

An EnBW Energie Baden-Wuerttemberg AG-developed offshore wind farm, the largest being built in the German Baltic Sea, won a 500 million-euro ($664 million) loan from the European Investment Bank.

The EnBW Baltic 2 farm with 80 turbines will power 340,000 homes a year when operating in 2014 after project costs of 1.2 billion euros, the Luxembourg-based EIB said in a statement.

Germany plans 25 gigawatts of offshore turbines by 2030 under a plan to shift from nuclear power. The EIB, the lending arm of the European Union, supports environmental projects and raised wind power loans to 1.7 billion euros in 2011, including plants off the coasts of Belgium and the U.K.

“Demanding projects are required so that Germany can implement its ambitious energy aims,” Wilhelm Molterer, vice president of the EIB, said in the statement.