Why Zephyr is investing big in Gothenburg

Why did Zephyr choose Gothenburg?

“When Zephyr was going to start the company in Sweden, it looked at Gothenburg as well as Stockholm, Malmö and Karlstad. Gothenburg has several companies established in the wind power sector and therefore has developed a competence base. This meant that Zephyr was able to immediately find two people with the right skills to step into the company from the start and build up the business. It was me and our Project Manager Simon Landqvist,” says Martin Petterson.

“Now that the company has grown and we have gone from 2 to 15 employees in two years, we can say that in Gothenburg we were able to find all the different skills we needed in the organization. We are very pleased about the growing team of fantastic employees that we have become.”

“Gothenburg also has a central and suitable geographical location, also from a Nordic perspective.”

You have plans to establish two offshore wind farms. Can you tell us more about them?

“It all started with an extensive screening for suitable offshore areas for wind power that we did during 2020. The screening covered the sea area in the whole of southern Sweden, including the east coast. We then found two areas off the Swedish west coast that proved to have very good conditions for offshore wind farms. There were many different reasons for this, not least the prerequisites for being able to obtain an environmental permit, but also technical factors such as wind conditions and grid connection possibilities.”

“We have chosen to call these two areas Poseidon and Vidar. Poseidon is located approximately 40 km north-west of Gothenburg, far out to sea, approximately 25 km from the nearest islands in the outer archipelago. Vidar is located further north in the Skagerrak strait.”

“Since June 2022, we have been developing these two projects together with Vattenfall, which is now the majority owner in a jointly owned company for Poseidon and Vidar.”

“With regard to these two projects, as well as other projects in the region, we also see the connection to the large increasing need for electricity generation in south-western Sweden. We are seeing very strong demand for this from the business community with a concrete interest in the need for new large-scale electricity production in the region.”

Once complete, how much will the new wind farms contribute to the electrical grid?

“Both areas will have an installed power effect of around 1,400 MW each. They have potential to produce over 10 TWh of electricity each year, which is equivalent to the electricity consumption of about one million Swedish households.”

How many jobs do you expect they will create?

“We estimate that we will need around 50 people engaged full-time in the operation and service of wind farms of this size. During the construction period, many more jobs will also be created. Here we also hope that the West Swedish business community prepares itself in time to be able to participate in this. There are very good opportunities as Gothenburg and the west coast already have good infrastructure, geographical location and know-how in the marine sector.”

Anything you would like to add?

“Personally, I think it is very sad that Sweden's skilled engineering industry, to a large extent, has missed the development and production of the wind turbines themselves. We who invest in wind farms buy the wind turbines from other countries, often Denmark and Germany, which have developed a large industry around this.”

“Offshore wind power in Sweden is a new large-scale business area with a new supply chain and manufacturing industry emerging, including, for example, around turbine foundations and their anchoring on the seafloor,” says Martin Petterssen.

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