EnergyOMNI's Perspectives I The Offshore Wind Farm Army? Rethinking Energy Infrastructure Security

Edited by EnergyOMNI

Poland

Twelve nautical miles out to sea from the town of Łeba on Poland's coastline, the first of 76 new wind turbines are beginning to pierce the fog. In total installed capacity of 1.2GW, the first of 76 turbines has been installed in July 2025. The Baltic Power project will be one of the country's biggest offshore wind farms. But its contribution to Europe's security goes beyond supplying power. The 120-metre towers are set to become sentinels, tirelessly scanning the brackish waters and leaden skies for hostile activity.

As the Polish state secretary for EU affairs, Ignacy Niemczycki, told Euractiv on a windy boat ride out to the site: "We are looking at infrastructure differently than we were one year ago."

When Finland and Sweden joined in 2023 and 2024, defence analysts dubbed the Baltic Sea "Lake NATO", with members of the military alliance effectively encircling it. But after three years in which the strategically important waters have been plagued by drones, spy ships, aerial stand-offs and blatant sabotage of power and communication cables, the moniker is starting to ring hollow. As the Polish state secretary for EU affairs, Ignacy Niemczycki, told Euractiv on a windy boat ride out to the site: "We are looking at infrastructure differently than we were one year ago."

NATO has discussed dotting offshore energy infrastructure with surveillance tools for years. In the past, turning oil rigs into military bases has proven unfeasible for cost, security, and engineering reasons, says Julian Pawlak, a research associate at Hamburg military university (HSU).  That's where wind turbines come in: They are tall, decentralised, and there are hundreds of them off the EU's Baltic coast. Already, wind turbines are equipped with bird sensors and transponders signalling their whereabouts to submarines, says Pawlak. Baltic Power – situated less than 200 kilometres from the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad – is equipping its new turbine towers with radars and sensors, following a security checklist drafted by Poland's defence ministry, Marcin Godek, the wind farm's operations and maintenance manager, explained in June.

Belgium

"There is a perfect symbiosis between offshore wind turbines and coastal protection," says Kristof Verlinden, a reserve Belgian coast guard who runs offshore wind farms at the firm, Parkwind. For Verlinden, they are also "sentinels or forward bases looking at the situation 50 kilometres or more from the coast". Verlinden said Parkwind has the foundations for the coastguard to install multi-use sensors and detection systems. Employees go to the offshore turbines almost daily and report back any irregularities.

In Belgium, Parkwind holds joint exercises "to train, verify and demonstrate our readiness towards security threats" with the coast guard, Verlinden said. "And we are ready to share our data such as AIS data, cable DAS, give access to our seaward looking cameras."

Sweden

However, the cases are different in Sweden. The Swedish government recently halted 13 offshore wind farm projects in the Baltic Sea citing "unacceptable consequences for Sweden's military defence" and interfering with the military. And turbines themselves have previously become the target of surveillance by the Kremlin.

The UK

Sweden is not the only country shares the security concerns. The UK government has pledged to quadruple offshore wind power by 2030 as part of its goal to decarbonise the grid. European nations are increasingly finding, though, that renewable energy projects are being opposed by their own defence ministries — with few areas suitable for wind energy generation that don't also obscure military radar.

Wind turbine blades made with stealth materials and masts that spot incoming missiles are among the technologies being considered to mitigate growing concern that offshore wind farms could hide enemy attacks from radar.

Radar works by pinging out radio waves, and waiting to see what returns. A raw radar feed is messy. Signals bounce back off hills, tall buildings and anything else within range. These can be removed afterwards by software. The problem with a wind farm, says Professor Marco Martorella from the University of Birmingham, is it is always moving, so the signal cannot be removed afterwards.

Philip Clark, an analyst at the Cowes radar research centre of BAE Systems, said: BAE is investigating whether smarter software approaches could interpret spinning objects. The Ministry of Defense and Department for Energy Security and Net Zero launched a competition to find other ways to enable early warning systems to see through and beyond wind farms. Richard Lee, from UK company Advanced Material Development (AME), is one of those with a project backed by the scheme. AME's approach involves stopping the reflections and it has developed a radar-absorbing paint that can coat the fibres used in construction, effectively giving the blades stealth technology. Livelink Aerospace takes a completely different approach. David Youngs, co-founder of the Chichester-based company, believes it could be possible to turn the problem into an opportunity. Livelink makes small, cheap, passive sensors. They would not see through a wind farm — but given there could be one on each turbine, they wouldn't need to.

During wartime, attacks on wind farms do not distinguish between state-owned and civilian facilities

Wind farms' growing importance also brings greater risk of attack. "The threats to offshore energy infrastructure are very real," says Giles Dickson, CEO of lobby group Wind Europe. "Assets are being attacked physically, not just cyberattacks," he added, pointing to several cable attacks in the Baltic Sea. Faced with this new reality, WindEurope has hired ex-military personnel to liaise with NATO. The managing director of Germany's offshore wind federation (BWO), on the other hand, thinks wind farms at sea should remain civilian and it is unacceptable that wind farms are equipped with military facilities.

However, during wartime, attacks on critical infrastructure make no distinction between state-owned or civilian facilities. Since the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine war, Ukraine has found that wind farms hold certain advantages over conventional power plants, making wind farms less likely to be the enemy's primary target. Compared with destroying a conventional power plant, it would take far more missiles for Russian forces to inflict serious damage on a wind farm due to the dispersed of turbines. Moreover, while wind farms can also be temporarily paralyzed if substations or transmission lines are destroyed, these facilities are generally easier to repair than a power plant.

Asia

In November 2023, The Diplomat published an article on Vietnam's offshore wind power development, "Offshore Wind in the South China Sea: A Counter-Salami Slicing Strategy for Vietnam," which examined the issue from the perspective of international relations. The author pointed out that China has employed a "salami slicing" strategy in asserting sovereignty in the South China Sea—such as its historical claims based on the nine-dash line, the gradual occupation and control of reefs belonging to the Philippines and Vietnam since the 1970s, and the transformation of Chinese-controlled coral reefs into artificial islands with maritime outposts. Vietnam's development of offshore wind power not only advances its energy transition but also serves as a form of "counter-salami slicing," reasserting control over its territorial waters. Offshore wind turbines can act as defensive infrastructure in delineating maritime boundaries; and once wind farms enter the operation and maintenance phase, the regular and irregular activities involved may also provide Vietnam with a legitimate reason to monitor China's unlawful activities in the South China Sea.

The Taiwanese think tank Voicettank also published an article, "Offshore Wind Power: A Challenge or an Opportunity for National Security?" which discussed the potential of combining offshore wind development with defense needs. Hundreds of turbines across the Taiwan Strait could form a "Great Wall of Wind Turbines." Defense experts have even envisioned the possibility of installing surveillance equipment on turbine foundations or nacelles, or using them to emit electronic signals to interfere with and neutralize external threats.