The largest offshore wind farm in the world just got a deadline. By 2012, the London Array should be powering 750,000 homes in the London metro area, the U.K. says, hinting at the potential to generate and sell massive amounts of clean electricity to continental Europe in coming years.
The stretch of Scottish coastline used for the array has now been dubbed "the Saudi Arabia of renewable power," which not everyone is pleased about. But it does emphasize just how important the development could be to Europe's clean energy strategy -- and the U.K.'s economy.
The array is a joint venture between E.ON, Masdar and DONG Energy -- representing the U.K., Abu Dhabi, and Denmark, respectively. The group just announced $2.9 billion (2 billion Euros) in partnerships with Siemens, JDR Cable Systems and Nexans for power generation and transmission equipment.
The first stage of the project will build 630 megawatts of capacity (roughly 25 percent of London's power needs), with an additional 1 gigawatt planned. This is if the facility is running at full speed. Most wind arrays operate at 30 percent on average. Construction is slated to begin at the end of 2011. Overall, the development could reduce emissions from the region by 1.9 million tons of carbon dioxide annually.
The array, including 341 turbines supplied by Siemens, will occupy about 95 square miles 12 miles off shore in the Thames Estuary, east of London. It will require more than 120 miles of underwater cables linking electrical components to the turbines, to be provided by JDR Cable Systems.
Transmission lines from the array to the grid will be built by Nexans of Norway, and will include fiber optic lines for sending large volumes of data. Siemens has actually signed onto a five year, 1 billion Euro contract to provide hardware and maintenance services to the London Array.
The offshore wind farm is just one project on a list of 25 proposed, in progress or completed offshore facilities in the U.K. With newly increased government subsidies and steady wind, the coastal area is primed for substantial power generation.
Some estimates put U.K. offshore potential at 25 gigawatts. In 2004, the U.K. consumed 393,000 gigawatt-hours of electricity, or roughly 45 gigawatts of steady generation. Even low-balling the real-life generation potential of wind, it is evident that offshore wind power will be important for the U.K's energy and economic future.
Duke Energy has launched several pilot programs to see if the same thing can be done in the U.S.