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| UK’s Sheringham Shoal offshore wind farm. Photo credit: Scira Offshore Energy Ltd / Statkraft via Flickr. |
By Anders Lorenzen
The UK government has given the go ahead to what will be the worlds largest offshore wind farm. The Dogger Bank Creyke Beck A and B wind project, will, if approved, be constructed in 2019 off the coast of East Yorkshire in northern England.
The wind farm is expected to create 900 local jobs and the 400 wind turbines, which will be erected 130 km off the coast, will provide clean electricity to an estimated two million households with a generating capacity of 2.4 gigawatts (GW).
The sheer scale and magnitude of this wind farm is far more ambitious than any other constructed on the British seas. To put it into perspective, the London Array offshore wind farm, currently the world’s largest, has a generating capacity of 630 megawatts (MW). Dogger Bank will be almost four times as big.
East Yorkshire is fast becoming the hub for offshore wind development in the UK; next year Siemens and ABP (UK’s leading port operator) will construct an offshore wind turbine production and installation facility, in the port of the city of Hull.
UK’s Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Davey welcomed the news stating; ‘“Making the most of Britain’s home grown energy is creating jobs and businesses in the UK, getting the best deal for consumers and reducing our reliance on foreign imports. Wind power is vital to this plan, with £14.5 billion invested since 2010 into an industry which supports 35,400 jobs.”
UK is currently the world leader in offshore wind power and is responsible for the installation of the majority of Europe’s new projects. Compared with onshore wind power, only a handful of countries have effectively entered the offshore market and all those countries are in Europe. The high cost of offshore has so far held many countries back, but with increased investments the costs are set to come down and the US, China and South Korea are all tabling plans to enter the market.
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Categories: DECC, Dogger Bank, ED Davey, Offshore wind, Renewables, Yorkshire. green jobs
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