Crown Estate announces wind bidders
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The Crown Estate has announced the successful bidders for the nine Round 3 offshore-wind zones, a development that could give the UK an extra 32.2GW of offshore capacity.
All parties have signed Zone Development Agreements with The Crown Estate to take the proposals through the planning and consenting phase.
The largest development is set to take place in the Dogger Bank Zone, where the Forewind Consortium - owned by SSE Renewables, RWE Npower Renewables, Statoil and Statkraft - proposes to develop 9GW of offshore capability.
Currently, offshore wind makes up just one per cent of the world wind market, according to Charles Anglin of the British Wind Energy Association (BWEA).
He added that power produced from these farms worldwide is currently only 1.5GW.
Anglin said that the development of the nine new sites in the North Sea could produce up to 32GW of power. ‘This will completely transform the scale of the industry,’ he added.
As to whether or not these sites will be fully operational by 2020, when at least 15 per cent of the UK’s energy supply will have to come from renewable sources, Anglin said that it depends on factors such as grid connection.
The developers of farms will need to connect their turbines to the grid with hundreds of undersea cables and the electricity network will need to be upgraded to handle the intermittent nature of wind power supply.
BAE Systems’ Jon Mills echoed these concerns when he told The Engineer Online that the developers need to look beyond installation and the immediate function of turbines and consider long-term maintenance.
Anglin added that there is also the issue of cost. ‘Offshore wind has been such a small market, so costs have been so high because so few manufacturers dominate the market,’ he said. ‘Up until now, offshore has only been one per cent of the market, so there’s been no incentive to invest. Now all the major players in the onshore market are looking to move offshore.’
Readers' comments (8)
Peter Smith | 11 Jan 2010 4:11 pm
Why are we wasting our time, effort and money on these ugly monstrosities? During the current cold weather conditions, with little or no wind, they would produce only a tiny fraction of the energy they are rated to produce. Where would our electrical supply come from over the last few weeks? Do we build a set of nuclear power stations as well for just such occasions or do we sit and freeze in the dark waiting for a warm front with some wind? How Green is it to build 2 power generation systems when you only need 1? The only predictable alternative energy seems to be from tidal, so that's where we should be concentrating our efforts.
PS: no, I don't work for a tidal energy company either!
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Dr Lewis Lack | 11 Jan 2010 4:36 pm
We really must see costs coming down for offshore wind to take off. If you look at the winners you will see that many of them are still proposing to use the same methods of installation and foundation systems that have caused high costs so far: specialist vessels, offshore assembly, steel rather than concrete...
It is time to change the game, reduce costs, risks and time to build - this requires alternative installation methods and foundations.
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paul wickens | 12 Jan 2010 7:44 am
If the government is so in favour of wind turbines why did it allow the only UK wind turbine manufacting facility on the IOW to close with the loss of 400 jobs?
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Peter Davis | 12 Jan 2010 2:26 pm
To point out an error in Peter Smith's comment - as someone involved in light aviation (I continuously check windspeeds) it has been quite breezy over the last few weeks. Actually, this has been the case for months. The wind speen seems to be mostly 10 - 20mph.
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George Manser | 12 Jan 2010 6:27 pm
Why not put all the turbines on a huge platform and move them about?
The platform could be moved with a new engine that has no emissions and capable of prime moving a generator of 11000v, or a gearbox for a huge platform. It can operate underground or underwater.
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Ramsay Imlach | 15 Jan 2010 12:06 pm
Personally I think wind turbines are attractive, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I doubt I will have a vantage point to see any on the Dogger Bank.
The answer to our energy problems is not wind, nor tidal, nor nuclear but a diversity of sources connected by a Europe wide grid to give continuity of supply.
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Chris Shaw | 31 Mar 2010 6:48 pm
To those who suggest that there is little or no wind around the British isles, I suggest they try competing in the Round Britain race for sailing boats. The race of about 2000 miles is conducted in the summer months totally under sail. Actual sailing times average about 14 days. In my experience, calms amount to about one day per fortnight..
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Dex | 7 Apr 2010 8:42 pm
It would appear that the government wants to be seen to be "green" and is throwing money at these power sources for political purposees. Until technology advances, the power output of these is a tiny fraction of say; nuclear. If the government doesn't put this money somewhere productive quick we will all be left in the dark.
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