(RCH) SCOTTISH WIND - SIMPLY THE BEST

Scotland’s 50-year North Sea petro-adventure is entering a new chapter. What comes next in a saga that has seen the former fishing port of Aberdeen grow into a global oil & gas industry hub, a technology-pioneering international sector supply chain spawned over the decades at sea, and many billions of barrels of crude pumped into Britain’s pipelines and beyond, will, as ever, be a voyage of discovery.

But what is increasingly certain is the transformative role that floating wind will have in the emerging North Sea 2.0 narrative, and globally as the world looks to the technology as a key new weapon in its decarbonisation arsenal in the years following COP26.

Home now to two world-title-holding floating arrays – the 30MW Hywind Scotland, the first-ever multi-turbine industrial development when it came online in 2017, and the 50MW Kincardine, just commissioned after lengthy delays and the biggest operating sector project on the planet – Scotland stands on the cusp of awarding vast swaths of acreage in its 11GW ScotWind round, 75% of which is in waters too deep for bottom-fixed foundations.

The immediate win for Scotland lies in this lead-off auction, as it presents the first opportunity for developers – an offshore wind who’s-who have put their names in to the tam o’ shanter with bids as large as 7GW – to roll out floating units in utility-scale project numbers. The huge volumes of clean power that will soon be flowing from far-offshore straight into the mainland grid – at ever-lower levellised cost of energy as the technology is streamlined and the onshore network digitised – is seen as central to achieving Holyrood’s ambition of reaching net-zero by 2045 - RECHARGE - link - Darius Snieckus - link - more like this - link

EQUINOR HYWIND SCOTLAND

It took 10 years to develop the first floating windfarm and it seemed to some a dangerous gamble to put it 15 miles off Aberdeen in the stormiest waters of the North Sea. But after three years of being in operation it has broken world records for maximum output.

Its success even outstrips the speed with which Europe’s other offshore windfarms, those standing in shallow water, have gone from being an expensive renewable option to a mainstream power source. Floating windfarms’ worldwide potential is even greater.

The scale of the first five floating turbines is staggering– 175 metres above the sea with another 75 metres below to balance the weight of the tower and the rotor blade with a diameter of 154 metres. The enormous height makes them a commercial success because further out to sea they can catch a steadily blowing wind and deliver more power.

The Norwegian company Equinor, which took the gamble on Hywind Scotland, has said the experience has allowed them to cut costs by 40%. The company is now building an even bigger floating windfarm off their home coast before looking for more sites around the UK.

They will have competition: firms are already scrambling to bid for floating wind sites off the Welsh coast and Cornwall - link - Paul Brown - link - more link this - link