Germany opens door to offshore wind returns as sector pressures grow

Oct 28 (Reuters) - Germany's Economy Minister Katherina Reiche on Wednesday said companies may return previously auctioned offshore wind farm sites, provided they pay a penalty to transmission system operators, as mounting economic pressures continue to batter the sector.

The move comes as increasing financing costs, overcapacity in certain sea areas and declining revenue expectations have made it harder for developers to deliver on awarded projects.

• In a letter to Reiche, the heads of eight of Germany's 16 states called on her to amend a bill before the German lower house of parliament

• They advocated for a one-time, legally secure option to return projects and for the sites to be retendered promptly

• Current site owners would be excluded from those new tenders, according to the letter

• Tenders for offshore sites that had been scheduled for this year were postponed until 2027 after no bidders came forward in August 2025

• Oil majors BP and TotalEnergies emerged in 2023 as the winners of a 7-gigawatt (GW) offshore wind site auction in Germany but have since faced supply chain inflation and dwindling revenue expectations

(Reporting by Holger Hansen in Berlin, writing by Tristan Veyet and Danny Callaghan in Gdansk; Editing by Tasim Zahid)