ESSEN: Norwegian power firm Statkraft expects to make an investment decision in the summer on a new gas-fired power plant in Germany as part of its growth strategy, its continental European arm said on Wednesday.

The plant, with a capacity of 450 megawatts (MW), would complement its existing activities at Knapsack in western Germany. Statkraft also plans capacity modernisation at its Emden generation site on the German North Sea coast.

Last September, Statkraft already announced it would build a 430 MW gas-fired unit at the Knapsack chemical park, and Wednesday's announcement would add a second new unit.

State-owned Statkraft is Europe's largest producer of renewable energy with experience in hydro power, which provides nearly all of Norway's electricity.

Juergen Tzschoppe, managing director for Germany, said that while the country was on a long-term track towards renewable energy, load requirements on its networks made it impossible to do without new fossil fuel-based investments, with gas the lowest in carbon emissions.

"The quick shutdown and restart times of gas plants are ideal to help them serve as bridging and complementary technologies on the road towards the energy landscape of the future," he said it said in a statement issued during the E-World trade fair.

The press release also said the company planned to boost  buying of selling of power sourced from wind and biomass plants in a number of European countries including Britain, Norway, Sweden and Romania.

The company will also look to expand its carbon emissions rights trading activities by setting up an office in Singapore in the summer of 2011, it said.

The idea was to make inroads from that carbon trade hub into opportunities in India, China and South East Asia, it said.