United Kingdom – As part of Crown Estate Scotland’s ScotWind leasing, Shell and ScottishPower have secured joint offers for seabed rights to develop large-scale floating wind farms.
A total of five gigawatts (GW) of power will be generated by the partners off the east and north-east coasts of Scotland. Two joint ventures, MarramWind and CampionWind, will construct the new wind farms.
Moving toward final investment decisions
MarramWind’s and CampionWind’s floating wind projects could generate enough clean energy to power the equivalent of 6 million homes in Scotland if they were built, respectively. This is more than twice as many homes as there are in Scotland at the present time. It is expected that the joint ventures will continue to move forward at a rapid pace in order to reach their final investment decisions.
Floating offshore wind potential
Fixed foundations are impractical in deeper water, which is where floating offshore wind farms excel. Most of Europe’s offshore wind resources are located in waters too deep for conventional bottom-mounted wind turbines. For the first time, a large-scale deployment of floating wind platforms has been planned for these deeper waters, despite the fact that this is a proven technology.
