The announcement by the Crown Estate of the successful bidders for each of the nine Round 3 offshore wind zones within UK waters represents a massive long-term investment opportunity and has the potential to generate thousands of jobs in the UK as well as securing a marine renewable electricity source. Round 3 offshore wind energy generation aims to deliver a quarter of the UK’s total electricity needs by 2020 and will see the European offshore wind capacity rise tenfold.
The nine development zones with a capacity of just over 32 GW have been allocated to 12 European companies including EDP (Portugal), RWE and E-ON (Germany), Mainstream (Ireland), Statkraft and StatoilHydro (Norway), Siemens (Denmark), and RES and Centrica (UK).
“Today’s announcement by the British government is a significant step forward for the offshore wind industry and, once built, will multiply by ten Europe’s offshore wind energy capacity”, said Justin Wilkes, Policy Director of the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA). “These are European companies building a European industry and generating some 45,000 European jobs. It takes Europe closer to exploiting the power of our seas and developing a brand new European offshore wind industry. Offshore wind is Europe’s largest untapped energy source. There is enough wind across Europe’s seas to power Europe seven times over.”
The 32 GW is part of the over 100 GW of offshore wind power currently being planned by European utilities, developers, and governments, mostly in the North Sea. Once operational this 100 GW plus would supply 10% of Europe’s electricity. In order to connect these farms to the electricity grid, EWEA has proposed a 20 year grid development plan. This year the European Commission will publish a Blueprint for a North Sea grid. This Blueprint was described by the Commission's 2008 second Strategic Energy Review as aiming to “interconnect national electricity grids in north-west Europe together and plug-in the numerous planned offshore wind projects”.
At EWEA’s Offshore Wind Conference in September 2009, EU Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs said: “harnessing the winds off Europe’s coasts would provide an answer to the global challenges of climate change, depleting indigenous energy resources, increasing fuel costs and the threat of energy supply disruptions”.
For additional information:
