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Offshore Farm Pushes U.K. Wind Power Past 5 Gigawatts (Update2)
2010-09-23 13:26:02.500 GMT
(Adds Loeseth comment in 11th paragraph.)
By Alex Morales and Marc Roca
Sept. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Britain's capacity to generate
electricity from the wind passed 5 gigawatts, enough for 2.7
million homes, as Vattenfall AB opened the world's biggest
offshore turbine farm southeast of England.
The 300-megawatt farm near Thanet means the U.K. has 1,341
megawatts of installed offshore wind capacity, more than the
rest of the world combined, industry lobby group RenewableUK
said today in an e-mailed statement. Britain also has 3,715
megawatts of onshore wind. The Thanet farm, whose 100 turbines
have operated since Sept. 5, was opened today by Secretary of
State for Energy and Climate Change Chris Huhne.
"The U.K. is going to be the fastest-growing market for
renewable energy anywhere for the next couple of years," Huhne
said. "We will urge the wind industry to install 10 times more
capacity by 2020. To this end, we are currently talking to
General Electric and companies such as Siemens and Mitsubishi
will play a part."
Wind power now accounts for 4 percent of U.K. electricity
consumption. Offshore facilities play a "make-or-break" role
in the U.K.'s goal to derive 15 percent of energy from
renewables by 2020, PricewaterhouseCoopers said in July.
Growing 'Quickly'
"Wind energy isn't an alternative source of energy
anymore; it's on the scale, and it's growing very quickly,"
RenewableUK Chief Executive Officer Maria McCaffery said in a
telephone interview. "This is the signal for a lot to follow.
The renaissance of U.K. manufacturing will come with it."
McCaffery said the growth of the offshore industry in
particular may create jobs as companies including General
Electric Co., Siemens AG and Clipper Windpower Plc plan and
build turbine plants in the U.K. She said it was vital for the
government to protect from spending cuts 60 million pounds ($94
million) earmarked to upgrade ports. The Treasury is working on
a package of cuts due to be announced Oct. 20.
"Investment is coming to the U.K. and in the wake of it
are thousands and thousands of jobs," McCaffery said. "The
onshore wind supply chain is already well-established in
Germany, Denmark and Spain. Nobody has an offshore wind supply
chain, and we want that to be here. U.K. manufacturing protects
us totally from exchange-rate fluctuations."
Offshore turbines are at present about three times more
expensive to erect and connect to the grid per megawatt,
according to McCaffery.
Political Support
"Good political support, lots of wind in the U.K. and an
attractive economic subsidy regime" are the spurs for offshore
wind farm developers to work in the U.K., David Hodkinson, head
of development for Vattenfall in Britain, said in a video clip
e-mailed by RenewableUK.
The Vattenfall farm was built at a cost of 900 million-
pounds ($1.6 billion), and includes 100 Vestas Wind Systems A/S
V90 wind turbines, according to the company website.
"The best place to currently build offshore wind farms is
the U.K.," Vattenfall Chief Executive Officer Oeystein Loeseth
told reporters visiting the farm today.
McCaffery said the goal for onshore wind is to reach an
installed capacity of 13 to 14 gigawatts by 2020. For offshore
wind, farms with 4 gigawatts of capacity have planning
permission or are being built and in January, the government
awarded licenses for 32,200 megawatts of projects to companies
including Centrica Plc, RWE AG and Statoil ASA.
For Related News and Information:
Top renewable energy stories: GREEN <GO>
U.K. power-market stories TNI UK PWRMARKET <GO>
Today's top energy news ETOP <GO>
U.K. electricity prices ELEU <GO>
Sustainability and environmental indexes SEI <GO>
--Editors: Reed Landberg, Mike Anderson
To contact the reporter on this story:
Alex Morales in London at +44-20-7330-7718 or
amorales2@bloomberg.net;
Marc Roca in London at +44-20-3216-4638
or mroca6@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Reed Landberg at +44-20-7330-7862 or landberg@bloomberg.net.
