Companies compete to develop transfer to offshore wind farms

According to the clean-energy organisation, registrations include more than 300 from the UK, 120 from North America and 110 from continental Europe, including 35 from Norway.

The global market opportunity for access solutions for deeper-water offshore wind environments is estimated to be worth more than £2bn by 2020 and, according to Carbon Trust research, the UK market alone could account for up to 50 per cent of that.

Companies from the oil and gas, ship building, marine engineering and aerospace industries have registered, alongside a number of universities. But with only two weeks to go until the application deadline, the Carbon Trust is calling for more entries with a specific focus on organisations from south-east Asia.

Offshore wind acceleration manager Phil de Villiers said: ‘We’ve had a terrific response from companies based in Europe and North America. However, we believe there may be technologies from the oil and gas sector in south-east Asia that could be applicable to the offshore wind market.