EU clears €2bn Belgian offshore wind aid; Finland designates four areas

Governments in Brussels, Helsinki and London moved offshore wind support between November 5 and November 10, 2026, and they part ways on who pays. Belgium will back its next North Sea wind farm with a two-way contract for difference worth up to €2.04 billion, which the European Commission cleared on November 10. Finland designated four areas in its exclusive economic zone under a model with no state aid. The UK and Japan signed an offshore wind compact centered on floating and deepwater technology that names no budget.

Belgium gets €2.04 billion for its first Princess Elisabeth farm

The European Commission approved a €2.04 billion Belgian scheme to support offshore wind on November 10, 2026, the Commission said. The money backs the construction and operation of the first wind farm in the Princess Elisabeth Zone in the North Sea, expected to have a capacity of up to 735 MW and to generate up to 2.6 TWh a year. The scheme runs for 20 years, and the developer will be picked in a competitive tender whose result is expected in the fourth quarter of 2027. Net Zero Industry Act criteria enter as tender prequalification rules, with a requirement to diversify supply chains for wind turbines and main components to reduce dependency on imports from outside Europe.

The support is a capability-based two-way contract for difference. Payments are calculated on the electricity the farm could have produced rather than what it actually produced: the developer receives money when the reference market price is below its bid price and pays the Belgian authorities when the reference price is above it.

This is the second time the Commission has cleared aid for this farm. In September 2024 it approved a €682 million scheme for the same first Princess Elisabeth farm, then sized at 700 MW and at least 2.6 TWh a year. That aid was not granted before its legal deadline of December 31, 2025, and the new scheme replaces it. By our arithmetic the new budget is about three times the old one, for 35 MW more capacity and the same 2.6 TWh, which has turned from "at least" into "up to".

Federal energy minister Mathieu Bihet called the approval the last piece needed to relaunch the tender (his office's release, in Dutch). The previous tender was interrupted in 2025 because of legal, financial and technical uncertainties, his office says, and the reworked framework also extends the construction period from four years to five.

Finland opens four sea areas, with no subsidy

Finland's government designated four areas in its exclusive economic zone for offshore wind on November 5, 2026, and issued a decree setting out how they will be tendered, according to accounts of the government's announcement by Offshore Wind and Baltic Wind. Two areas lie in the Bothnian Sea and two in the Bothnian Bay. Bothnian Bay South goes first, and Baltic Wind reports the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment as saying the Energy Authority could launch that tender as early as the first half of 2027, with the other three areas to follow. Bids will be scored on price and qualitative factors, each counting for 50 per cent.

The tendering model does not include state aid, and the government says 10 to 15 years can pass between a tender and commercial operation, per Offshore Wind. Baltic Wind quotes Climate and Environment Minister Sari Multala: "Offshore wind power projects often take many years to develop. That's why it is important to start preparing now, even though offshore wind power in Finland's exclusive economic zone is not yet profitable on market terms." Denmark's recent awards for North Sea I Mid and Hesselø run the other way: the winner is guaranteed its bid price for 20 years from completion, as we reported on Vattenfall's Danish contracts.

The government also proposed Water Act amendments on building and decommissioning wind farms in the zone, including rules on decommissioning obligations and financial security, per Offshore Wind. As a general rule, farms would have to be fully dismantled at the end of their lives, although the Finnish Supervisory Agency could assess case by case how much of the structures must be removed down to seabed level, and the legislation is expected to enter into force in spring 2027.

The UK and Japan sign an offshore wind compact

The UK's Department for Energy Security and Net Zero and Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry signed an offshore wind industrial compact on November 10, 2026, with Minister of State for Energy Michael Shanks signing for the UK and State Minister Takagi Kei for Japan. It sets out four pillars: co-investment in both countries' projects, testing and demonstration of floating and deepwater technology, supply chains (in particular for turbines), and sharing UK expertise and policy frameworks with Japan in areas including financing and market frameworks, grid operation and certification.

The compact is a framework with no money attached: it names no budget and no capacity target, and delivery falls to Great British Energy and the energy department on the UK side and to METI on the Japanese side. Its governance includes annual director-level discussions. The two sides call it a first step, building on a 2025 memorandum of co-operation, and agree to work toward the potential for bringing other like-minded partners into it.

Japanese companies are already in British offshore wind. The compact cites their participation in UK floating projects in Allocation Rounds 6 and 7 and commercial structures such as JERA Nex bp, and in a notice published November 5 Ofgem named a consortium including Chubu Electric Power preferred bidder for the Dogger Bank B transmission link, as we reported. Public money for floating demonstration is already committed elsewhere in Europe: Norway's Enova awarded NOK 3.94 billion to two floating wind projects at a test site off Karmøy, announced on October 30.