More monster wind farms set to loom over Britain’s coast
But power will cost 40% less than Hinkley
A NEW generation of giant offshore wind farms will produce energy more cheaply than nuclear power, it was revealed yesterday.
The cost of energy from the supersized turbines is forecast to be around 40 per cent less than that from the Hinkley Point development.
Three massive farms off the coast of England and Scotland have been given the go-ahead by the Government. Together, they will provide enough electricity to power 3.6million homes. However energy industry insiders said that other options would still be needed for ‘when the wind drops’.
The biggest of the three new turbine farms will be Hornsea 2, 55 miles off the Yorkshire coast. It will become the world’s largest with capacity to supply over 1.3million homes when it is finished in 2020.
Approval has also been granted to Moray Offshore off the north-east coast of Scotland. The farm will provide enough electricity for close to a million homes. A scheme at Triton Knoll, which is off the coast of Lincolnshire, will also supply power to approaching 900,000 homes.
The move comes despite warnings from campaigners about the threat turbines pose to wildlife and criticism about green energy subsidies – which have sent household bills rocketing by around £110 a year.
It also raises questions about the reasons for shifting to renewable energy. Successive governments have claimed that using gas to generate electricity is likely to become more expensive. However, gas prices have not spiked as expected.
Recent technological improvements, competition among firms and the development of turbines bigger than skyscrapers have helped to bring down the cost of wind power.
As a result, two of the new wind farms, which will go online in 2022, will be paid £57.50 per megawatt hour (MWh) for their output. This is half the £117.14 price for power from wind farms approved in 2015.
Significantly, it is also well below £92.50 per MWh promised by the Government to the French and Chinese developers of the new Hinkley Point C nuclear plant in Somerset.
Chief executive of trade body Renewable-UK, Hugh McNeal, described the fall in prices as ‘astounding’. He said: ‘Recordbreaking cost reductions like the ones achieved by offshore wind are unprecedented for large energy infrastructure. Today’s results mean that both onshore and offshore wind are cheaper than gas and nuclear.’
However, EDF, the French firm behind Hinkley, said: ‘New nuclear remains competitive for consumers who face extra costs in providing back-up power when the wind doesn’t blow.’
Tom Greatrex, chief executive
‘Extra costs for back-up power’
of the Nuclear Industry Association, added that wind power alone could not solve the challenges facing the British energy industry.
Ministers claim that the offshore wind industry will deliver £17.5billion of investment in the UK up to 2021. One manufacturer of the supersize turbines, MHI Vestas, is making the blades on the Isle of Wight and then transporting them to Bel- fast for assembly before they are moved into position. Separately, Siemens is making blades for its turbines in Hull.
Energy minister Richard Harrington said: ‘We’ve placed clean growth at the heart of the industrial strategy to unlock opportunities across the country, while cutting carbon emissions.’
He said the UK has the largest offshore wind capacity in the world and low carbon businesses have a combined turnover of £43billion, employing 234,000 people.
The push towards renewable energy such as wind comes at a time when world gas supplies are in fact relatively plentiful.
Pipelines from Norway and Europe feed into the UK national grid and Britain started importing relatively cheap shale gas from the United States earlier this year.
The RSPB has previously expressed fears that four developments in Scotland could kill tens of thousands of birds.