Seabed landlord the Crown Estate granted developers the rights to extend six UK offshore wind farms in the last six months, boosting the UK’s pipeline by 2.8GW.
It had previously awarded leases for extensions of the Dudgeon wind farm in April, Gwynt y Môr project in June, and Galloper and Sheringham Shoal sites in August.
The seabed landlord has now approved rights for extensions of the Rampion and Greater Gabbard offshore wind farms.
If delivered as expected, the project extensions could double the capacity of the six existing wind farms, adding a further 2.8GW of capacity to the UK’s offshore wind fleet.
The full-list of projects now granted extension leases is:
- Equinor’s 317MW Sheringham Shoal Extension Sheringham Shoal Extension (317MW) OffshoreEngland, UK, Europe Click to see full details;
- Equinor’s 402MW Dudgeon Extension Dudgeon Extension (402MW) OffshoreEngland, UK, Europe Click to see full details;
- RWE and SSE’s Greater Gabbard (504MW North Falls (Greater Gabbard Extension) North Falls (Greater Gabbard Extension) (504MW) Offshoreoff Suffolk, England, UK, Europe Click to see full details);
- RWE (25%), Macquarie 25%), Siemens Financial Services (25%), ESB (12.5%) and Sumitomo Corporation’s (12.5%) Galloper (353MW Five Estuaries (Galloper Extension) Five Estuaries (Galloper Extension) (353MW) OffshoreEngland, UK, Europe Click to see full details);
- RWE (50.1%), Macquarie (25%) and Enbridge’s (24.9%) Rampion (extension known as 400MW Rampion 2 Rampion 2 (400MW) OffshoreEngland, UK, Europe Click to see full details);
- RWE (60%), Stadtwerke München (30%) and Siemens Financial Services’ (10%) Gwynt y Môr (extension known as 576MW Awel y Môr Awel y Môr (576MW) OffshoreWales, UK, Europe Click to see full details).
Developers will now need to carry out environmental assessments and surveys, before seeking planning consent through the statutory planning process and securing connections to the grid, the Crown Estate explained. They would also need to secure power deals for output from their respective projects.
The Crown Estate is also due to award leases to support a further 7GW of offshore wind development in UK waters.
Combined with the existing portfolio of projects already in operation, construction and planning, these actions will take the UK offshore wind pipeline beyond 40GW – the government’s target for 2030.
