The UK awards licences for £ 100-bn wind farms project

The UK awarded licences to 16 leading European companies to develop 32 GW of offshore wind energy at an estimated cost of £ 100-bn, which would be among the largest alternative power projects in the world.
The new wind farms, under the UK's Round 3 offshore wind energy generation, will be on a far bigger scale than anything so far in the country and aims to deliver a quarter of the UK's total electricity needs by 2020. Significantly, the new projects will be located further offshore than previous wind farms.

The expansion of electricity generation from offshore wind represents a massive long-term investment, which the backers of the project say has the potential to generate several thousand jobs in the UK and secure its marine renewable electricity source. Among the 16 companies involved in the development of the projects are RWE Npower Renewables, Statoil, Statkraft, Siemens Project Ventures, Scottish Power Renewables, Vattenfall Vindkraft, Centrica Renewable Energy RES Group and Iberdrola.
All the developers have signed exclusive zone development agreements with The Crown Estate, which is responsible for renewable energy in the UK waters.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown said, ''Our policies in support of offshore wind energy have already put us ahead of every other country in the world. This new round of licences provides a substantial new platform for investing in UK industrial capacity."
Brown also said, "The offshore wind industry is at the heart of the UK economy's shift to low carbon and could be worth £ 75 bn and support up to 70,000 jobs by 2020. This announcement will make a significant and practical contribution to reducing our CO2 emissions and the Government will work with developers and The Crown Estate to support the growing offshore wind industry and help remove barriers to rapid development.''

According to secretary of state for energy and climate change, Ed Miliband, ''Our island has one of the best wind energy resources in Europe and the news shows we're creating the right conditions for the energy industry to invest in harnessing it."
"This is one of the strongest signals yet that the UK is locked irreversibly into a low carbon, energy secure prosperous future.''

The developers who have signed exclusivity zone agreements are:
1. Moray Firth Zone, Moray Offshore Renewables which is 75 % owned by EDP Renovaveis and 25 % owned by SeaEnergy Renewables -- 1.3 GW.
2. Firth of Forth Zone, SeaGreen Wind Energy equally owned by SSE Renewables and Fluor -- 3.5 GW.
3. Dogger Bank Zone, the Forewind Consortium equally owned by each of SSE Renewables, RWE Npower Renewables, Statoil and Statkraft -- 9 GW.
4. Hornsea Zone, Siemens Project Ventures and Mainstream Renewable Power, a consortium equally owned by Mainstream Renewable Power and Siemens Project Ventures and involving Hochtief Construction -- 4 GW.
5. Norfolk Bank Zone, East Anglia Offshore Wind equally owned by Scottish Power Renewables and Vattenfall Vindkraft -- 7.2 GW.
6. Hastings Zone, Eon Climate and Renewables UK -- 0.6 GW.
7. West of Isle of Wight Zone, Eneco New Energy -- 0.9 GW.
8. Bristol Channel Zone, RWE Npower Renewables, the UK subsidiary of RWE Innogy -- 1.5 GW.
9. Irish Sea Zone, Centrica Renewable Energy and involving RES Group -- 4.2 GW.