Equinor and BP spent three years as equal partners in two offshore wind lease areas off New York and Massachusetts. In January 2024 they split the partnership down the middle, each walking away with one project, and described the exchange as cash-neutral. Enerdatics still records a $400 million value against one side of it. The question is what that number is measuring.
Key takeaways
- Equinor agreed on 26 January 2024 to acquire BP's 50 percent stake in the Empire offshore wind projects off Long Island, made up of the 816 MW Empire Wind 1 and the 1,260 MW Empire Wind 2, taking full ownership. The value of the Empire leg was not disclosed.
- In the same swap, BP took full ownership of the 2,590 MW Beacon Wind projects and the Astoria Gateway for Renewable Energy site, while Equinor took BP's half of the South Brooklyn Marine Terminal lease. Both companies described the exchange as cash-neutral apart from standard working capital settlements.
- Enerdatics records a value of $400 million on the Beacon leg, which grossed up to 100 percent of 2,590 MW is about $0.31 million per MW, compared with about $0.50 million per MW implied by the $1.1 billion BP paid in 2020 for half of the then 4.4 GW combined portfolio.
- In January 2024, before the swap was announced, BP and Equinor terminated the NYSERDA offshore renewable energy credit agreements for Empire Wind 2 and Beacon Wind 1, after inflation had lifted their adjusted prices to $115 per MWh and $126.3 per MWh.
- Equinor secured a $3 billion debt package for Empire Wind 1 in January 2025, against an estimated total capital investment of about $5 billion, with power sold to NYSERDA under a 25-year agreement at a strike price of $155 per MWh.
Why would two partners swap halves rather than sell?
Because a swap lets each side concentrate without either one writing a cheque. Splitting the portfolio gives each company projects it controls outright and can fund, bid and build on its own timetable. Equinor and BP said the agreement gives them flexibility to pursue their respective priorities under their corporate strategies.
Equinor was the natural owner of Empire. It signed the federal lease for the area in March 2017, and when BP bought in during 2020 the deal kept Equinor as operator through development, construction and operations. The cost was of a different kind: Equinor said full ownership would raise its near-term reported capital expenditure.
What does the $400 million on the Beacon leg actually measure?
It is the only priced reference point in the transaction, and it should be read as a value attached to BP's side of the exchange rather than as cash that moved. Enerdatics does not record a separate value for the Empire leg, so the Beacon figure cannot be turned into an Empire price.
What it can show is how far US offshore wind leases had repriced since the partnership began. A 50 percent stake must be grossed up to the whole project before comparing it per MW, otherwise the price looks half as high as it is. Recorded against 2,590 MW at 50 percent, the $400 million works out at about $0.15 million per MW of stake, or about $0.31 million per MW for the whole project.
The 2020 entry price sets the comparison. BP paid $1.1 billion for half of a portfolio then sized at 4.4 GW, which grosses up to about $0.50 million per MW. On that basis the lease areas were valued roughly 38 percent lower in 2024 than when the partnership was formed. The seabed had not changed in the meantime. The contracts underneath it had.
What happened to the contracts between 2020 and 2024?
They stopped covering the cost of building. An offshore renewable energy credit, or OREC, is a payment New York's energy authority NYSERDA makes per MWh of offshore wind output, fixed at auction for a 15-year term. Empire Wind 1 won its OREC in 2019 at a nominal $99 per MWh and Empire Wind 2 in 2021 at $107.5 per MWh. Beacon Wind 1 won its 2021 award at $118 per MWh.
Inflation adjustments lifted those prices in 2023, but not far enough. In January 2024 the partners terminated the Empire Wind 2 and Beacon Wind 1 agreements, citing inflation, higher interest rates and supply chain disruption. Equinor submitted Empire Wind 1 into New York's fourth offshore wind solicitation, and Empire Wind 2 was left to bid in later rounds. The swap was therefore a division of projects that, apart from Empire Wind 1, no longer had a price to sell their output at.
The rebid shows how much the price had to move. When Equinor raised $3 billion of debt for Empire Wind 1 a year later, the project was selling to NYSERDA under a 25-year agreement at $155 per MWh, against the $99 per MWh nominal award of 2019. The term grew and the price rose by more than half. The same rising costs that pushed Vattenfall to sell its Norfolk zone to RWE were reshaping offshore portfolios on both sides of the Atlantic.
Enerdatics records 13 US offshore wind M&A transactions announced between January 2023 and June 2025, nine of them with a disclosed value. Three development-stage stake sales cluster tightly once grossed up to 100 percent: Orsted's purchase of Eversource's half of the 924 MW Sunrise Wind for $152 million in January 2024 prices at about $0.33 million per MW, Ocean Winds' purchase of Shell's half of the 2,400 MW SouthCoast Wind for $360 million in March 2024 at about $0.30 million per MW, and the Beacon leg at about $0.31 million per MW. TotalEnergies' sale of 44 percent of Attentive Energy for $420 million in October 2023 sits at about $0.35 million per MW. Across the Atlantic, Masdar's stake in Dogger Bank South priced at about $0.44 million per MW for a UK project at a similar stage.
What does the deal signal for US offshore wind?
It marks the point where joint ventures began to unwind into single owners. Within two months, Orsted took full control of Sunrise Wind from Eversource, Ocean Winds took full control of SouthCoast Wind from Shell, Equinor took Empire and BP took Beacon. In each case a partner that no longer wanted the exposure stepped out at a price around a third of a million dollars per MW, and the remaining owner took the whole project into a rebid or a renegotiation.
That pattern says the market was pricing US offshore leases as options on a future contract rather than as projects. Empire Wind 1 is the one project from the partnership that went back to auction, cleared at a higher price and reached financing. Empire Wind 2 and Beacon Wind have no such contract recorded.
Frequently asked questions
What did Equinor pay BP for its half of Empire Wind? The value of the Empire leg was not disclosed. The transaction was a swap described by both companies as cash-neutral, with BP taking Equinor's half of Beacon Wind in exchange. Enerdatics records a value of $400 million on the Beacon leg only.
What is an OREC? An offshore renewable energy credit is a payment per MWh of offshore wind output made by NYSERDA, New York's energy authority, under contracts awarded through competitive solicitations. It provides the main revenue stream for New York offshore wind projects.
When is Empire Wind 1 expected to operate? The deal record from January 2024 expected commercial operation in 2026. The financing record from January 2025 puts commercial operation at December 2027, and records the project at 810 MW.
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