The world’s largest
offshore wind farm
began operations
this month
in the North Sea.
The first 50 turbines at the
Hornsea One wind farm,
75 miles off the east coast
of Yorkshire in
the United Kingdom,
are now generating electricity
for up to 287,00 homes.
Hornsea One,
operated by Ørsted,
will have 174 turbines
with a total capacity
of 1.2 gigawatts (GW),
enough to power
1 million homes
when completed in 2020.
Hornsea will send electricity
to the UK, Netherlands, Belgium,
Germany, and Scandinavia,
with more than twice the capacity
of the current largest offshore
operation, also in the UK.
Teams of workers
will live at sea
for two weeks at a time
maintaining the wind farm.
“Operating a wind farm
this far offshore
is unprecedented,”
said David Coussens,
deputy operations manager
for Hornsea One,
to Offshore Wind,
a trade publication.
“We’ve had to
think creatively
and come up
with new ways
of working to overcome
the logistical and technical
challenges of operating
a massive power station
120km [75 miles]
from the shore.”
The UK currently has 8.2 GW
of offshore wind capacity,
representing 44% of Europe’s
entire offshore wind production.
The UK aims to double
its capacity by 2030,
and is planning to build
an equally large wind farm
next to Hornsea One.
The United States has just
30 megawatts of offshore
wind capacity.
Hornsea is going to be
heavily subsidized
for the next fifteen years.
This year it will receive
a guaranteed payment
of £158.75/MWh
for every unit
of electricity
it can produce,
compared to the current
market price of £45/MWh:
Hornsea’s total capacity of 1.2GW,
due on stream in the next two years,
can expect to receive annual subsidies
of £430m for the next fifteen years,
all index linked, on top of the revenue
for the electricity they actually sell.
Not a good deal for the taxpayers.
Source:
