In brief
- The Government has approved the list of the three perimeters in the Black Sea that may be granted under concession for wind farms at sea. It is the step without which the auctions cannot start.
- The three zones add up to 948 km² and an estimated capacity of 3,100 MW, that is 3.1 gigawatts, above the 3 GW target that the 2025-2035 Energy Strategy had set for 2035.
- The perimeters are defined by exact coordinates, in the WGS84 system, and the annex shows for each of them what constraints exist: shipping routes, military zones, oil and gas infrastructure, migratory birds, protected habitats.
Published: Official Gazette of Romania (Monitorul Oficial) no. 716 of 27 August 2026
In force from: 27 August 2026
From 27 August 2026 Romania knows, down to the geographical coordinate, exactly where the first wind farms in the Black Sea can be built. Government Decision no. 664/2026, published in Official Gazette of Romania no. 716 of 27 August 2026, approves the list of offshore wind perimeters that may be granted under concession in the Romanian sector of the sea. It is the act that turns a law from 2024 into a map, and it comes two days after the action plan for the local supply chains in this field.
The act has a single article. It approves the annex and states that the perimeters are defined by geodetic coordinates in the WGS84 reference system, the same system any GPS uses. The legal basis is Article 7(1) and (3) of Law no. 121/2024 on offshore wind energy.
The annex is the part that matters. It describes three offshore concession perimeters, each with its outline given point by point, together with the area, the estimated capacity, the power density, the average wind speed at 150 metres above sea level, the water depth range and the levelised cost of energy, expressed relative to the cheapest of the three.
The figures, as they appear in the table: perimeter 1 covers 631 km², with an estimated capacity of 1,900 MW, a nominal power density of 3 MW/km², wind of 7.8 m/s and depths between 63 and 75 metres. Perimeter 2 covers 149 km², 600 MW, a density of 4 MW/km², wind of 7.9 m/s and depths between 55 and 67 metres. Perimeter 3 covers 168 km², also 600 MW, a density of 3.6 MW/km², wind of 7.7 m/s and depths between 65 and 75 metres. All three are designed for turbines on fixed foundations, not for floating turbines.
The levelised cost of energy, that is the price at which a megawatt-hour would have to be sold for the investment to pay for itself over the life of the farm, is lowest at perimeter 1, taken as the benchmark at 100%. Perimeter 2 comes out 2.1% more expensive and perimeter 3 10.5% more expensive. The difference comes from the wind and from the depth: perimeter 3 has the weakest wind and the deepest water.
Four days later the Government also said what it costs: a 0.75% royalty and fees of 800 and 1,500 euro per square kilometre.
Four days later the procedures followed: how the development approval is obtained and how a wind farm is dismantled at the end.
What it changes in practice
Only the concessionaire of such a perimeter can apply for the exploration permit, and its methodology came out on 1 September 2026: 428 days after the deadline written into the law.
The immediate effect is that the concession procedure now has an object. The 2024 law built the mechanism, but an auction cannot be held over an entire sea; it needs a delimited perimeter. From 27 August 2026 the three perimeters exist as legal entities, with an outline closed by coordinates.
The second effect is that investors can compare. The annex does not stop at drawing the outline, it publishes for each zone the data a developer would normally have to establish on its own and at its own expense: wind speed at rotor height, water depth, power density and, above all, relative cost. From the first table an investor can see which perimeter is the most attractive economically and how much it loses by choosing another.
The third effect is the information about risks, and here the act is unusually open. For each perimeter the annex lists the constraints on three levels, biodiversity, social and technical, with the share of the area they cover and a sensitivity score. Perimeter 1 has migratory birds and bats over 100% of its area, protected habitats over 90% and fish over 70%. Perimeter 2 has bats and protected habitats over 100%, marine mammals over 90%. Perimeter 3 has bats and marine mammals over 100%.
The annex says plainly that, at these percentages, avoiding the sensitive zones is no longer possible inside the perimeter. It also states, however, that the presence of such an element does not mean incompatibility with wind farms, but the obligation of a project-level assessment and of mitigation measures.
On the technical side, all three perimeters overlap almost entirely with oil and gas infrastructure: 95% at perimeter 1, 100% at the other two. The fields that affect them are named: Istria and XV MIDIA for the first, EX-25 LUCEAFARUL for the second, NEPTUN XIX 1 for the third. Militarily sensitive zones also appear, east of perimeter 1 and west of perimeter 2, together with the Odesa-Bosphorus route, of which the annex notes that it currently carries low traffic density.
What has changed compared with the previous situation
Until 27 August 2026, offshore wind energy in Romania was a law without a map. Law no. 121/2024 had set the framework, the concession rules and the competences, but it did not say where. In the absence of perimeters, the State could not put anything up for auction and an investor could not prepare a project, because there was no surface on which to place it.
The level of detail the State puts on the table has changed as well. The annex contains the complete outlines, point by point: 15 vertices for perimeter 1, 4 for perimeter 2 and 12 for perimeter 3, each with eight decimals. The areas calculated from these coordinates are 629, 148 and 168 km², against the 631, 149 and 168 declared in the table, so deviations below half a percent, explainable by the projection. The published outlines and the declared areas describe the same zones.
The third thing that has changed has to do with ambition. Romania’s 2025-2035 Energy Strategy had set 3 GW installed by 2035. The three perimeters add up to 3.1 GW, so the list covers the target with a small margin. It is not an extension of the objective, but exactly as much as is needed for it to be reached, if all three are granted under concession and built.
Advantages and disadvantages
What it improves
- It unblocks the procedure: without delimited perimeters, the auctions provided for by Law no. 121/2024 could not begin.
- Transparency that is rare for a Romanian act: the State publishes the wind, depth and relative cost data a developer would have paid for as a study.
- The constraints are stated up front rather than discovered at the permitting stage, which shortens the road to an investment decision.
- The outlines can be checked by anyone, since they are given as coordinates and not as descriptions.
- The total capacity covers the target in the energy strategy, so the list is consistent with the declared policy.
- All three zones are chosen for fixed foundations, a mature technology, not for floating solutions that are still expensive.
What remains a problem
- The decision approves the list, but does not say when the first auction starts, nor in what order the perimeters go on the market.
- The almost total overlap with the oil and gas perimeters is flagged but not resolved: who has priority remains a matter of negotiation.
- The margin above the 3 GW target is only 100 MW, so if one perimeter is not granted under concession, the objective in the strategy can no longer be reached from this list.
- The act mixes two ways of writing numbers in the same document: the table uses the English separators, „1,900” for the 1,900 MW and „7.8” for the 7.8 m/s, while the text above it keeps the Romanian convention and writes „3,1 GW”. Read the Romanian way, where the comma is the decimal mark and the full stop the thousands separator, „1,900” means 1.9, a thousand times less.
- There is no deadline for the project-level environmental assessments the annex announces as necessary.
- Grid connection, which decides whether a 1,900 MW farm can be absorbed by the system, does not appear in the act at all.
Practical advice
- If you are preparing a project, read the relative cost column first, not the capacity one. The 10.5% gap between perimeter 1 and perimeter 3 translates directly into the price asked at auction.
- Check the coordinates in your own GIS before making any estimate. They are given in WGS84, with eight decimals, so they can be imported directly.
- Look at the coverage percentages, not only at the list of biodiversity elements. An element present over 10% of the area can be avoided by where the turbines are placed; one present over 100% cannot.
- For perimeters 2 and 3, plan the discussion with the oil and gas licence holders from the outset: the overlap is 100% and the fields are named in the annex.
- Fishermen and aquaculture operators in the area have reason to look now, not at the permitting stage: aquaculture and fisheries appear with moderate sensitivity over 85% of perimeter 1 and over 100% of perimeter 2.
- If you follow the subject from the angle of the cost to the consumer, remember that depth and wind explain the price difference between the zones better than area does.
Frequently asked questions
Does this mean wind farms are going to be built in the Black Sea?
How much energy would they produce?
Where are the three perimeters located?
What does relative LCOE mean?
Why are some perimeters more expensive than others?
What happens to the protected areas and to the birds?
Do they overlap with the oil and gas zones?
What kind of turbines can be installed?
Editorial analysis
Technically, this is one of the best made acts of recent times. It does not merely draw three polygons, it publishes the reasons why they look exactly as they do: where a boundary stops because of the Odesa-Bosphorus route, where because of a militarily sensitive zone, where because of depths beyond 75 metres, the threshold past which a fixed foundation stops paying for itself. The areas from the published coordinates close with deviations below half a percent, and the declared densities check out when capacity is divided by area. An act that survives an arithmetic check is a rarity.
The openness also has a practical function, not only a civic one. By publishing the wind at 150 metres, the depths and the relative cost, the State moves part of the pre-feasibility study off the shoulders of investors and onto its own, which in theory should show up in lower prices at auction, because the risk of the unknown goes down.
What is missing has to do with the next step. The act says where, but it does not say when, nor in what order. The margin above the target in the energy strategy is only 100 MW out of 3,100, so the whole declared policy depends on all three perimeters being granted under concession; if one falls through, the 3 GW target can no longer be reached from this list, and the act does not provide any mechanism for adding a fourth. And the 95% and 100% overlap with the oil and gas perimeters is honestly flagged but left unresolved: who gives way, on what conditions and with what compensation is written nowhere.
What should be changed
- A timetable for the auctions, even an indicative one. A target date for the first perimeter would let developers schedule their studies and their turbine orders, which are placed years in advance.
- A rule on coexistence with the oil and gas licence holders. The fields are named in the annex, so the cases are known; what is missing is only the norm that says how the space is shared.
- A mechanism for completing the list. With a margin of 100 MW above the target, the act should provide for how a perimeter is added if one of the three is not granted under concession.
- One single convention for writing figures. In the same annex the text writes „3,1 GW” with the comma as decimal mark, the Romanian way, while the table writes „1,900” MW and „7.8” m/s with the English separators. The meaning can be worked out from the context, but the two conventions read the same figure a thousand times apart, and in an act quoted in tender documents only one of them should be on the page.
- A mention of grid connection. A 1,900 MW farm is worth nothing without the capacity to deliver into the grid; the act would gain if it referred at least to the transmission network development plan.
- Deadlines for the environmental assessments it announces. The annex says that project-level assessments are necessary, but does not say at which stage of the procedure they are carried out and who bears them.
Original text of the legal act
The text below is reproduced in Romanian, the official form of publication.
The full text, as published in the Official Gazette of Romania
Official Gazette of Romania no. 716 of 27 August 2026 16 pages PDF, 115 KB the act starts on page 12
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This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. For specific situations, consult a licensed attorney or tax advisor.