Subsidy-Free Wind Power Possible in $2.7 Billion Dutch Auction

Netherlands seeks bids to build 700 megawatts of offshore wind
Higher power prices spur developers to rely on market alone

Wind turbines stand in Barrio Jauca, Santa Isabel, Puerto Rico, on Monday, Oct. 23, 2017. For longer than most can remember, Puerto Ricans have paid some of the highest energy costs in the U.S. to a notoriously unreliable utility that neglected their grid for years and runs fossil-fuel plants that may be damaging their lungs. A month after Hurricane Maria devastated the island, power lines still lay slack along roads, utility poles are snapped clean in half, and most Puerto Ricans remain in the dark.Photographer: Xavier Garcia/Bloomberg

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By Anna Hirtenstein and Rachel Morison

December 14, 2017 at 5:00 AM UTC

This article is for subscribers only.

Subsidy-free renewables could appear in a second country after an auction this week in the Netherlands, which is seeking about $2.7 billion to develop a giant offshore wind farm.

The government on Friday will receive bids to install 700 megawatts of turbines on the seabed off its southwest coast near The Hague, enough to supply about 1 million homes. Once the most costly of the mainstream clean-energy technologies, offshore wind costs have plunged sharply in the past two years as manufactures brought out bigger turbines.