SolarDuck, a Dutch offshore floating solar company, announced that it has secured €4M from a consortium of venture capitalists and strategic investors from the Renewable Energy industry.
SolarDuck says it will use the funds to finalise the technical roadmap and produce the first full-scale offshore floating solar power plant with 500 KWp capacity at the coast of Ostend, Belgium, by the end of the year.
“We take pride in the group of shareholders that we have, all sharing the drive to change how we produce our energy”, says Koen Burgers, CEO of SolarDuck.
“With these funds, we will be able to finalise the technology roadmap and start delivering the first solar plants, allowing our customers globally to generate their electricity at competitive price levels,” he adds.
SolarDuck: What you need to know
Founded by Koen Burgers, Don Hoogendoorn, Olaf de Swart, Ewoud Huiskamp, and Harry Post in 2019, SolarDuck provides societies access to affordable renewable electricity using offshore floating solar power plants.
The Dutch company has developed a modular solution that can sustain the harsh offshore environment while providing competitively priced energy. SolarDuck’s solution is also optimised for other offshore sites like natural harbours, estuaries, and near-shore sites.
“It is more or less a semi-sub structure that is used in offshore floating wind projects,” explains Burgers in an interview with PV Magazine. “What we did was connecting these platforms in a smart way and by elevating the platforms you get much less wave resistance,” he says.
The company’s floating platforms are triangular structures measuring 16 x 16 x 16 metres. According to the company’s claims the triangular shape of the floating structure can handle dynamic loads and waves.
In an interview with PV-magazine, Don Hoogendoorn, SolarDuck CTO, says, “We designed it with the offshore safety standard in mind. Due to the triangle shape and large size of the platform, it is relatively stable and this enables safe operation and maintenance services at sea.”
SolarDuck is a spin-off from the research department of the Damen Shipyards Group in the Netherlands, which designs solutions that help cope with the harsh maritime environment.
Investors
“We have been part of this journey almost since the start and we are amazed by the quality of the team and their advancements in this short period of time,” says Christian Rangen, Chairman of Norwegian-based Link Capital. “We are privileged to lead the consortium of investors that allows SolarDuck to develop towards commercialisation”.
The Dutch company has been assisted by Impulse, a Corporate Finance boutique based in Utrecht, the Netherlands.
“Meeting SolarDuck for the first time, we were impressed by their technical and commercial capabilities. In raising funds we were happy to add our capabilities resulting in a successful close, allowing SolarDuck to make the impact it’s after,” says Feddo Tamminga, Partner at Impulse.
