Floating offshore wind projects will receive more than £60 million in public and private investment to develop new technologies that will enable turbines to be located in the windiest locations around the UK’s coastline.
The UK Government announced earlier today that 11 successful projects will each be awarded up to £10 million as it puts forward £31.6 million to boost the amount of clean renewable energy generated in the country. In addition to this, industry will match the investment bringing the total funding available to over £60 million.
It will boost R&D in floating offshore wind and help to accelerate the deployment of turbines around the UK coastline. Research will focus on areas such as how turbines are moored to the seabed, undersea cabling and the development of foundation solutions.
The UK is already home to the world’s largest deployment of offshore wind, however floating turbines, which can be deployed in deeper waters than conventional turbines, will boost energy capacity even further by allowing wind farms to be situated in new areas around the UK where wind strengths are at their highest and most productive.
Energy Minister Greg Hands said: “We are already a world leader in offshore wind and floating technology is key to unlocking the full potential of the seas around Britain. These innovative projects will help us expand renewable energy further and faster across the UK and help to reduce our exposure to volatile global gas prices.
“By stimulating development now through the Floating Offshore Wind Demonstration Programme, the costs of building and locating floating turbines in deep-water areas will come down faster, growing the UK supply chain and supporting the target in the Prime Minister’s Ten Point Plan of delivering 1GW of energy through floating offshore wind by 2030.
One such project receiving more than £9.6 million is a collaborative scheme with bases in Edinburgh, Belfast, London and Doncaster, developing and demonstrating new technologies for mooring floating turbines to the seabed, cable protection, a floating turbine base design and an advanced digital monitoring system.
Another project with bases in Cambridge, Feltham, Aberdeen and Blyth, will get £10 million for bringing forward a compact floating turbine foundation and anchors that will likely enable a 2MW, or larger, turbine to be demonstrated in UK waters.
This new funding announcement follows support for floating offshore wind in the fourth allocation round of the Contracts for Difference scheme – the Government’s flagship renewable energy auction scheme - where £24 million a year has been ring-fenced for this emerging technology. It also follows the announcement by the Prime Minister in October for £160 million of funding to develop and build new large-scale floating offshore wind ports and factories in the UK.
Professor Deborah Greaves, director of the Supergen Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Hub, said: “I am delighted that the Floating Offshore Wind Demonstration Programme will support new projects in key areas of research and innovation for the ORE sector.
“The new projects are well aligned with the Research Landscape of the Supergen ORE Hub and demonstrate the great benefit to the sector of academics and industry experts working closely together — using their combined knowledge and expertise — to advance the UK’s ‘net zero’ goals.