£200m floating wind farm will be world’s first

Turbines made as part of a £200 million project to create the world’s first floating wind farm are set to be towed from Norway to Scotland.

The pioneering Hywind windfarm will be situated 15 miles from Scotland’s east coast at Peterhead.

Turbines will be tethered to the sea bed using a 78-metre-tall underwater ballast and three mooring lines. The scheme is being developed by Statoil, a Norwegian oil and gas company which wants to diversify away from carbon-based fuels.

Five turbines are sitting in a fjord off the west coast of Norway, awaiting transfer across the North Sea. Statoil expects to have five 6MW turbines bobbing in the North Sea and generating electricity by the end of this year. The North Sea is well suited to hosting offshore windfarms because of its shallow waters.