The Trianel Windpark Borkum I offshore wind farm, located in the North Sea off the island of Borkum, has been prequalified for Germany's balancing energy market, according to a press release from Trianel GmbH published on August 27, 2026. The facility has started marketing negative secondary control power, a service that has so far been dominated by thermal and hydro plants able to quickly adjust their output. This mechanism allows transmission system operators (TSOs) to keep production and consumption of electricity in balance in order to preserve grid frequency stability. Prequalified providers are compensated for making their facilities available on a flexible basis.
A dedicated remote-control infrastructure
What sets this announcement apart is that an intermittent production facility—an offshore wind farm—manages to meet the technical responsiveness and reliability requirements normally associated with dispatchable generation. According to Trianel, this capability rests on a remote-control infrastructure developed specifically for the wind farm, which transmits the transmission system operator's requests in real time and automatically implements the required power adjustments. The company describes this architecture as redundant and highly available, though it does not detail its technical specifications.

In the case of negative secondary control power, the producing facility must reduce its injected power upon an automated request from the transmission system operator, within a timeframe set by regulation. The wind farm remains connected to the German transmission grid via the DolWin1 high-voltage direct current link, operated by TenneT, the transmission system operator responsible for this part of the North Sea.

An economic diversification claimed by the company
Trianel presents this entry into the balancing energy market as a way to increase the wind farm's financial attractiveness, in addition to the over-the-counter power purchase agreements it has already signed. This diversification would fit, according to the company's management, into a multi-market value-creation strategy for all of the group's generation assets, grouped under its virtual power plant structure, led by Mr. Lars Becker, head of the Virtuelles Kraftwerk department at Trianel GmbH. The press release does not, however, detail the pricing structure, the expected remuneration from this activity, or the duration of the prequalification obtained.

This announcement follows a change in the wind farm's operational governance. Since January 1, 2026, Mr. Florian Würtz has held the position of technical managing director of Trianel Windkraftwerk Borkum GmbH & Co. KG (TWB I), Trianel Windkraftwerk Borkum II GmbH & Co. KG (TWB II), and Infrastruktur Windkraftwerk Borkum GmbH & Co. KG (IWB). He succeeds Mr. Bernd Deharde, managing director of TWB I for ten years, who left at his own request at the end of 2025. Mr. Klaus Horstick, for his part, was confirmed in his role as commercial managing director of TWB I and TWB II at the same date.

A leadership change effective January 2026
Trianel describes this reorganization as a response to the growing demands of operational management and the long-term strategic development of its offshore wind farms. The press release does not specify whether the move into the balancing energy market had already been planned by the previous management or constitutes an initiative of the new team. No public reaction from the transmission system operator or a regulator has been identified at this stage regarding the announcement, which remains a commercial and technical communication issued by the company itself.