Norway's looming "supply squeeze"

Norway is normally an exporter of electricity to its neighbours , but experts are sounding alarm bells. They warn that the increase in demand from electrification and data centres will eclipse the country's abundant power supply. Has Norway now reached that crucial turning point? 

In this episode, Richard sits down with Nordic market experts at the Pareto Securities conference in Oslo to discuss the how government subsidies are distorting investment decisions, and why major demand drivers like data centres need faster grid reforms and connections. 

Host: Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News

Guests: 

Erik Strømsø - CEO and Co-Founder, BW ESS

Jørn Skaane - CEO, Lefdal Mine Datacenter

Lars Ove Skorpen - Director of Power & Renewable Energy, Pareto Securities

Contributor: Petter Udland - Norway Reporter, Montel News

Editor: Oscar Birk

Producer: Sarah Knowles

Subscribe to the podcast on our website, via Apple Podcasts or Spotify

Transcript

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 0:05

Hello listeners and welcome to Plugged In - the Energy News podcast from Montel, where we bring the latest news issues and changes happening in the energy sector. Norway, normally has an abundance of hydropower. And is often a net exporter to its neighbors. But are we reaching the crucial turning point for this regional powerhouse, perhaps a looming supply squeeze as demand starts to overtake supply. That, at least is the view of many experts. In this episode, I sit down with Nordic market experts to tackle some of the key issues facing the region. But first, I spoke to our Norway reporter, Petter Udland, to understand how soon we are gonna see the shift in supply and demand. And to get a gauge on the current political backdrop. Now I'm joined by Petter Udland, reporter Norway. A warm welcome to the podcast Petter.

Petter Udland - Norway Reporter, Montel News: 0:59

Thank you very much.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 0:59

We're talking here about the Norwegian supply and demand balance In general, would you say that Norway is facing. A power supply squeeze in the coming years?

Petter Udland - Norway Reporter, Montel News: 1:09

There's several analysis that point towards that. Certainly the TSO in their analysis assume that we will have, not a deficit, but certainly a weakening power balance, increased consumption, not as much increased production. But it's worth noting that they have said this for a long time, and it has been postponed several times. The time when this supposed deficit will occur or this tightening power balance will occur. But certainly several players are pointing.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 1:36

It is not only the TSO though, right?

Petter Udland - Norway Reporter, Montel News: 1:37

No. Several others as well. And they add the the regulator for instance, and several the bureaus and marketplace actors in such pointed the same direction. DNV for instance are also pointing in that direction,

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 1:48

so maybe not. Actual deficit, but certainly a weakening of the,

Petter Udland - Norway Reporter, Montel News: 1:51

certainly a weakening power balance. Every sort of experts are pointing in that direction.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 1:56

So these are the signs that are coming from various different angles, from different associations and bodies. What's been the political response Petter?

Petter Udland - Norway Reporter, Montel News: 2:04

It's quite wary. We have spoken to the Prime Minister who said to us that he's very wary of any kind of political intervention here, prioritizing one industry over the other, saying that we can only have that type of industry and not the other. So he's been singling anyway that he is not, he's very reluctant to do anything. At the same time, the government is exploring actually prohibiting crypto centers, mining crypto and such. They want to ban that. Actually, they haven't quite figured out how to do it yet. But then there's also other political players in Parliament, for instance, who have proposed a concession system for data centers. One, a more tighter control over this. So it's not. Clear, but certainly the ruling government who is a minority, it must be said in parliament, doesn't have a majority there. They seem to be reluctant to politically intervene in this,

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 2:52

so they don't wanna pick winners, but they've certainly picked a loser with the crypto people in a sense. Yeah.

Petter Udland - Norway Reporter, Montel News: 2:57

And they do they are concerned about this. So they are continuously arguing that, well, we need to facilitate build out of more power. That is that's their melody and their cure. They wanna build themselves out of the problem essentially.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 3:09

What about data centers? That is Norway building out data centers. Is it keen to incentivize them to come to Norway? And could one describe 'em as the new kind of aluminum smelters of Norway, Petter?

Petter Udland - Norway Reporter, Montel News: 3:20

Certainly the interest from investors are seemingly there, there's a lot of data centers are queuing up asking the TSO for connection and it's certainly the category of industry that is by far asking for the most capacity in the grid. Politically, I think it, again, it's like it's varied. Type of data centers are certainly welcome. Other things like crypto or more sort of speculative things are not as welcome. And and again it varies in the political environment. I think the governments, the signals are, they are given are that yes, they do welcome this type of industry. They want to see it established, but not maybe all types. Other players are simply saying, no, we don't want any kind of data centers. But certainly the interest from the investors and the people who want to build this seems to be quite so significant.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 4:04

And we'll, we were speaking to some data centers later, but Peter, thank you very much for setting the scene here, telling us what the situation is currently like in Norway.

Petter Udland - Norway Reporter, Montel News: 4:11

Thank you.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 4:13

So are Norway's household energy subsidies, specifically the Norgespris, the equivalent of an opioid crisis for Norway? Well, that's certainly the opinion of one of our guests who I spoke to at the Pareto Securities Conference in Oslo last week. I sat down with Lars Ove Skorpen, Director of Power Renewable Energy at Pareto Securities, as well as the CEO of BW ESS, Erik Strømsø and the CEO of Lefdal Mine data center, Jørn Skaane. Here's what they had to say about how subsidies are distorting investment decisions and why there is an urgent need for grid reform and faster connections. So Lars Ove I'd like to start by, by asking you a question. We're here at your Pareto Securities conference in Oslo. It's the end of January. You made some very interesting comments this morning about Norgespris the way that Norway basically subsidizes householders. What did you say?

Lars Ove Skorpen - Director of Power & Renewable Energy, Pareto Securities: 5:09

I said it's wrong. This is in reality our opioid crisis. And we are sedated by this because it makes us not care about when we consume and how much we consume of electricity. That's problem in reality. That also means that we are not insulating our houses. We're not investing in heat pumps and we're not putting a rooftop solar. In our home homes. So that's the problem.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 5:35

And it, it's something that certainly I have written about before and we continue to write about the Montel News and I'm, you can be rest assured that I have my solar panels firmly in place. But what is the investment climate like at the moment in Norway and the Nordics about investing in renewable energy? Where are we?

Lars Ove Skorpen - Director of Power & Renewable Energy, Pareto Securities: 5:51

I think it's been a little bit challenging because let's say we have had a government that has been a little bit back and forth on the tax side. They have introduced tax, for instance, for wind power that cause quite many of the international investor to decide to divest their stakes. Hopefully now we can get more stability from a politician so that Norway could perceive a more. Paulette, low risk country to invest in going forward. I think right now the sentiment is better. And data centers is by far the hottest infra sector to invest in. The problem with the data centers is that they don't get the grid. They have the money, they're ready to invest, and they are investing, but there's not enough grid because we are not building enough and we are too slow in moving. And that's what I called upon to the TSO and the DSO today.. Start investing in grid.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 6:51

I think that's an important message, and it certainly applies to, to all of Europe, plus, or I think the applications to get on the grid are huge, whereas actual the successful grid connections are not so large, put it that way. But what's happening on the supply side? Where's that coming from? Where's that gonna be coming from? The coming years?

Lars Ove Skorpen - Director of Power & Renewable Energy, Pareto Securities: 7:06

Well, as you saw my graphs on the supply side. You probably didn't see them because it's hard to see them because there's nothing there basically compared to what it used to be. So basically, I think we're seeing like maybe 800 gigawatt hours of the five last years. If you go back six, seven years, we had seven Terawatt hours in a single year of new supply into the market. That was of course during the wind boom, and then everyone stopped because the municipalities got a veto right on this one. But I think we have to come back again, start to invest in wind. Because it is by far the cheapest cost of energy with levelized cost. That is maybe around Norgespris, any other source actually is much higher.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 7:48

Yeah, absolutely. I will want to touch upon some of those questions a little bit later but Eric, if I can, and ask you what's your view here? I know you maybe don't have any sites or locations in Norway, but you have, in the Nordics and the wider European markets, what do you see happening here in terms of new supply coming online?

Erik Strømsø - CEO and Co-Founder, BW ESS: 8:05

What we're seeing is that. Exactly what Lars Ove says that if you look at a market like Norway, they're actually distorting all of the signals that we are seeing in other markets. So in other markets, you're seeing negative prices, high volatility, and other challenges, but the right challenges standing in the way of bringing new supply into the market. For instance, whether it's solar or wind. In most markets outside of Norway where you stabilize the prices, the biggest challenge is you have a lot of negative prices. Which basically kills the case for solar and wind. You have major challenges with imbalance pricing. These are things that we need to solve, and if you don't get the signals through, then you don't see that these problems exist. So those signals are coming in Europe and that's why there is a very strong push for energy storage. Because energy storage is helping to solve some of these problems essentially by shifting energy from when it's produced to when it's needed, and also helping to sort out imbalance pricing for things like wind.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 9:03

But surely, I mean, battery. It's a perfect incentive for battery storage operators when there's a high instance of negative prices, for example.

Erik Strømsø - CEO and Co-Founder, BW ESS: 9:10

Yes, it is. But the beauty of it is that you can actually support a battery business case. While at the same time improving the business case for a solar developer that wishes to build a solar plant, saving the consumer money because when they come home from work, they get cheaper electricity. So it's a win-win for everybody.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 9:28

How do you overcome these challenges then? You've mentioned a few, what is it all in hands of governments and policy makers, or is there something also general the market participants can do as well?

Erik Strømsø - CEO and Co-Founder, BW ESS: 9:38

Well, I think in general, of course, what we looking for as storage developers, just like any other developers or data center operators for that matter is predictability and increased speed from the grid operators. And, in many ways there are issues with the grid, but the grid is also on average, underutilized. And so the constraints happen at certain times and in certain locations. Those problems can typically be solved by thinking about the grid in a slightly different way. You can't build grid the way you did 50 years ago. You need to think differently about grid. You need to think about conditional grid connections. And you need to make sure that. The projects that you prioritize are the projects that are getting built. It's very difficult for a grid operator to basically decide what's the best project, but easy to know what's the worst project, 'cause the worst project is the one that doesn't get built.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 10:32

But they're still in the queue, potentially there. The, so that there's a way that of filtering them out that maybe the grid operators need some help in doing that.

Erik Strømsø - CEO and Co-Founder, BW ESS: 10:40

Yes. Yeah, exactly.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 10:41

But there's not, we don't have a grid operator here with us on the, on this panel, but so they can't we have to take that to them at a later date. But Jørn what's your view here on what you're hearing, and is it the grid operator should take a lot of the blame here? That some of the issues here could be alleviated through, absolutely sorting out the grid.

Jørn Skaane - CEO, Lefdal Mine Datacenter: 10:57

I don't think we should turn this into some kind of blame game because the explosion in demand for power has, when we applied for 60 megawatt extra in 2019, it was just a formality and we got it. Now there's a struggle and there's a queue and there's a maturity assessment, and this situation has come fast on both the TSO and the DSO saying that, it's important that when the world now has turned around and everyone wants access to power or a lot of projects, then it's, they also need to adapt to the new situation, not continue working as they have always done. And that is come maybe something they could be challenged a little bit more about that, and I think, but I think they are getting there, but maybe not as fast as obviously we who are in the queue now could have hoped.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 11:41

What's your view of what you're hearing from Lars Ove and Eric was saying about in terms of this rollout of supplies, that there's still some challenges here especially in Norway.

Jørn Skaane - CEO, Lefdal Mine Datacenter: 11:50

Like I said, we are in the queue and we know that in front of us there are several projects related to battery factories, hydrogen, ammonia, and they have this power reserved. At least not all of them will be materialized. And then it's kind of important that the tsos.net do their proper work in reviewing the progress plan annually and are tough enough to take the project that has no, that the market is not there, the funding is not there, the customers are not there. And then take them at least outta the reserves part and then back in the queue again. And to make sure that the power now, which is there, is put into use. And for us, we can see how, how much we can make out of the power. We have the 80 megawatt. We are producing job making competence large. We are about 200 people now. Work still showing up at Leftal every day between 200 and 250. And that's is some organic growth and we, that we want that to continue for many years, but then we need more power.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 12:46

It's fascinating here 'cause I think it's a lot to do with that queue, isn't it? Is it sorting out the queue, getting that criteria right. And making sure that the good projects get to the head of the queue and we get the weak ones out. Is that something you'd agree with as well? Lars Ove?

Lars Ove Skorpen - Director of Power & Renewable Energy, Pareto Securities: 12:58

Yeah. I totally agree, but it's it's the grid companies, let's face it. They're not set up to do this job because they are not Warren Buffet who picks winners and losers. So in reality, they have this first come, first serve criteria, which probably is right. But then as Jørn says, you have to have the assessment criteria to see, do you have a customer, do you have financing, et cetera, et cetera. And I think Jørn is actually very kind when you say that maybe some of the ammonia hydrogen players are not gonna be there. Because if you look at what Statnett themself are saying, who's actually then also the one who look at the application for grid. They're actually saying that not even 10% of this is gonna be realized

Jørn Skaane - CEO, Lefdal Mine Datacenter: 13:42

for the ammonia hydrogen,

Lars Ove Skorpen - Director of Power & Renewable Energy, Pareto Securities: 13:43

for the ammonia hydrogen. If you look at what they actually say, they say that there's gonna be 1.2 TWatt hours from this sector in 2030, and they are actually queuing for effect of 3.5 gigawatt. But if you take Statnett estimate, that means that only 170 megawatt will be realized versus, again, I repeat the 3.5 gigawatt they're asking for. So in reality, StatNet should look at their own research who says. More or less, none of these are gonna be here.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 14:17

Yep. And I think you could say, if you say the same picture is, you know, or it's a similar picture across Europe because this is happening, we've seen over the years that people are very keen to announce plans, but they're not so keen to announce them when they scrap them. But what other challenges are there on for the data centers in Norway? You mentioned certainly the grid Q and I think there's a very important point that needs to be sorted out and made much more efficient. But are there other challenges Jørn?

Jørn Skaane - CEO, Lefdal Mine Datacenter: 14:40

No. I would say that is the challenge, number one, two, and three, because the funding is there, the market is there, customers are there. So everything is in place, but without the power, we don't have anything. So to get access to more power is crucial for the entire industry.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 14:54

Absolutely. Yeah. But that's not, it's also amount that the power needs to be there, isn't it?

Jørn Skaane - CEO, Lefdal Mine Datacenter: 14:58

No. That could be ramped up in, in modules. So it's several ways to handle it. And also about this power on oh, I forgot the word, what we got Condition on. Condition and seek for alternatives way to handle it and be a little bit creative. Can this be handled more different? Have it for a shorter period for loan. This, that could be a condition. So there are several way to handle it, but we need to be creative and think a little bit more business like them, a government, all monopolists are used to do. But if the will is there, there's always a way.

Lars Ove Skorpen - Director of Power & Renewable Energy, Pareto Securities: 15:27

And also maybe I'll add they need to run the grid harder as well. You know, these guys are actually, they're having a highway. The speed limit is 110, but in reality, they're asking everybody to drive at 70 kilometers an hour. We have to be able to at least drive closer to the speed limit.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 15:45

Absolutely. That's that fair point, I think. Eric, where do you see, what do you see as the sort of hotspot in terms of energy storage in Europe?

Erik Strømsø - CEO and Co-Founder, BW ESS: 15:53

We've been focused on this market for almost 10 years now, and, you know what we quite early had conviction on is the fact that you're gonna need energy storage everywhere. And there's a few exceptions here and there. There's a business case in Norway as well, but it's not quite so strong because you have a lot of hydropower. But in general there is a real need for energy storage in most markets, and there's a good business case for it as well. Markets go in and outta fashion. Germany is very hot at the moment. There are arbitrage opportunity, there looks amazing, but there is a lot of uncertainty around tariffs and fees that you need to pay in timelines and conditionality around grid connections. So it does have its challenges. Italy was very hot for a while. The grid operator there, did a very good job in running an auction that was very competitively priced.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 16:43

A positive a positive comment on the TSO though.

Erik Strømsø - CEO and Co-Founder, BW ESS: 16:47

Yeah, no I made this comment earlier today as well. I think the biggest winner of that auction was Terna themselves and they basically taken their destiny into their own hands. They said, we want batteries. We're gonna control the batteries. We'll give you a 15 year contract. And that gives them more flexibility and buffers in their system, which probably will make them more comfortable letting everybody else drive at 110 kilometers per hour because they have batteries to avoid some of the issues that can otherwise arise.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 17:16

And which segments of the market are you seeing most action in terms of, is it the balancing side, the intraday? We're not, we're quite far away from day ahead, I would presume, but.

Erik Strømsø - CEO and Co-Founder, BW ESS: 17:26

The typical sort of way that these markets evolve is that you start with ancillary services, the balancing and the frequency support being a major part of the business case. And then slowly battery batteries monopolize that entire market so that hydropower and gas and others are just not able to participate anymore because they're too expensive and too slow. And then gradually batteries also then start to get a substantial amount of the revenue stack from basic energy arbitrage, which is much more difficult to saturate because it's the whole market. And that is the long term business case that you need to believe in if you're gonna build batteries. And as long as we continue to bin, build wind and solar, then that goes in a natural lockstep with the development of flexibility. That unlocks the ability to build more solar and wind, which again, supports building more flexibility.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 18:18

So it's a virtuous circle in some ways. Lars Ove, I've been reading as well Norway that, some analysts, some forecasters have said that Norway may need to rely on imports of electricity in 10 or 15 years time. What's your view here?

Lars Ove Skorpen - Director of Power & Renewable Energy, Pareto Securities: 18:33

That's true. Some would say that that they also said that five years ago and last year we had a record export of 23 Terawatt hours. It is correct that we had record export last year, but we also have record production and there's been delay, call it in the demand for power. But right now, I would say there's nearly an infinite demand. The problem is that they don't, as we've, discussed now, they don't get grid. So actually the power here but the grid is not here and at the right place. And then I think that all the analysts expect that power surplus, if you like, that's going to de diminish over time. And maybe we're gonna get to a balanced market, which I think is fine. Because that just means that we have actually then done something value added with that electricity instead of sending out as raw electrons on a cable and then let other people call it do that value add. So I think that's fantastic. But then again, back to the problem here is that we have to build more renewable power in order to be ahead of the curve. Because obviously if we get to that bounce point, then power prices are also gonna increase. And we unfortunately. Are grown up with consuming a lot of power. Our houses are big. We only use power, not gas, like in the continent.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 19:54

And obviously, building wind in certain localities and always very problematic. It's not very popular and there's a lot of nimbyism. How can you overcome that

Lars Ove Skorpen - Director of Power & Renewable Energy, Pareto Securities: 20:04

In a way that's also the problem with the Norwegian price, Norgespris, because then people don't feel a need for new power because, why should we have new power? I pay 40 euro per kilowatt hour. That's not a problem. So I think that you have to face the real power price in order to make, change your mind on this one.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 20:23

Absolutely. And there's a debate building up in Norway about nuclear. Is that the answer, do you think, Jørn?

Jørn Skaane - CEO, Lefdal Mine Datacenter: 20:29

It's a big question. It is not a quick fix. But personally I think, yeah, that will eventually be here. Yeah, I think so.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 20:36

Because you're looking to, other data centers, across the world. They're closely align themselves with SMRs in the States or as well, that developing in Norway, in the Nordics.

Jørn Skaane - CEO, Lefdal Mine Datacenter: 20:46

I cannot see why, but it's a political thing and it's and it's a bit up and head, but in my opinion, we will have nuclear power and SMRs within a period of time.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 20:55

That's very interesting. Even though that may come as a higher price.

Jørn Skaane - CEO, Lefdal Mine Datacenter: 20:58

I think so.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 20:59

What's your view, Lars Ove?

Lars Ove Skorpen - Director of Power & Renewable Energy, Pareto Securities: 21:00

I think, of course everything is relevant when it comes to time because I think Jørn is right. This is more a timing issue. I don't think it's gonna be here the next 10 years, maybe the next 15. But of course it's expensive. I went through the levelized cost of energy today on nuclear power and let's say if the Fortum is right, that's around 150 to 200 euros per megawatt hour. And of course, if you're going to build that and need that price in order to have a profitable business, then obviously we see that either there has to be huge support to do this or the prices has to go up significantly. And I think that we probably cannot see the price go to that level because then we should have built a lot of wind before that. So I think it has to come to, in addition, but it needs support.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 21:52

Do you think Eric, that SMRs can coexist with with batteries and the storage systems?

Erik Strømsø - CEO and Co-Founder, BW ESS: 21:58

I think they can, I think they can play a role in the energy system. I think it's it's fascinating how much we talk about nuclear and how little we build of it. This is not a new technology. Even SMRs, it's not a particularly new technology. It is expensive as Lars Ove mentioned, and also we talk about base load as if it's the solution. But actually, if you look at demand patterns, it's not base. We don't need the same amount of energy every hour, every day. And so for nuclear also. Battery is actually a help because when you have negative power prices and a lot of volatility and large sections of the day where actually you can't profitably run your nuclear power plant, then your business case also weakens. So I think we will have some nuclear, but I think the amount of time we spend talking about it is, orders of magnitude more than what it will actually impact the energy system.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 22:51

Absolutely. I can hear there's a background that I think they've turned the DJ has started. So probably we'll have to, we'll have to draw this discussion to a close gentlemen, but just one final question really. And that's, so I know we are, we're past Christmas now but I was thinking if you had a wish, one wish for policymakers in Norway or even at the European level, what would it be? Jørn?

Jørn Skaane - CEO, Lefdal Mine Datacenter: 23:12

Number one. Work on the queue and the projects that's there, and also how literature. Number two, like Lars Ove said, perhaps the highway of power could, the speed could increase from 70 to 80. That will probably solve a lot of problems. And also consider, consider what project that adds most to the community, not just first come, first search regardless of everything but see this a little bit broader. What actually contributes and make ripple effects in the area.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 23:40

Absolutely makes sense, Lars Ove?

Lars Ove Skorpen - Director of Power & Renewable Energy, Pareto Securities: 23:43

Do as little as possible. And let me clarify that, because very often when they try to do something, it ends up doing the wrong thing. Taxes changing regulatory regimes, et cetera, et cetera. I would say be more business friendly. And try to see where we're going, where Norways is gonna be as a nation, because we have to capture this wave. This is a new industrial wave that we see here right now, and I think that the Minister of Digitalization who was here today. She has a fantastic attitude towards this, but I think there's, politicians here on the fringe that is not so positive. But I think this could be the new oil moment for Norway.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 24:24

Okay. Stay off. Stay away. Yeah. Eric?

Erik Strømsø - CEO and Co-Founder, BW ESS: 24:28

Yeah. I think as Lars Ove says, it's probably a case of not doing too much. It's very difficult to assess these projects. I think one easy thing that you can do without too many resources is just make sure that people do what they said they were going to do and invest when they said they were going to invest. Instead of letting them linger in the connection queue and holding up other projects that are actually ready to commit and to build the industry.

Richard Sverrisson - Editor-in-Chief, Montel News: 24:51

I think those wishes are loud and clear. Jørn, Erik and Lars Ove thank you very much for being guests on the Plugged In podcast. And to you listeners, thanks for listening to this episode of Plugged In. If you enjoyed this discussion, please like, rates and follow to make sure you get the latest podcast episodes as soon as we release them every Thursday. We'd also love to read your reviews of the podcast. It helps us to keep up to date with what you, our listeners think of the podcast and what content you want to receive more of. Finally, you can head to montelnews.com for more news and analysis from our team of journalists across Europe and beyond. See you next time.