A report from RenewablesUK has shown that UK companies represent a significant proportion of global offshore wind contracts provided to date, as IRENA predict that the industry is set to grow by more than six times over the next 15 years.
So far, UK based companies have secured a total of 115 contracts to develop and work on 50 different offshore wind farms across the world. With a total of 250 offshore wind farms in development at the moment, this gives UK companies a large share in a fast growing and lucrative market.
RenewablesUK’s report explains that the UK has played key role in the growth to date of the offshore wind industry, and is set to continue to with several new projects in the pipeline. Since “the higher end contracts in [their] analysis were valued at £30m”, the large number of active contracts is set to provide a lot of money for British companies.
“The UK is,” according to RenewablesUK, “the undisputed world leader in offshore wind energy and has been for a number of years. Offshore wind currently powers the equivalent of over four million homes a year, and this will grow to eight million by 2020.”
Interestingly, as BusinessGreen reports, the British offshore wind industry is one that is set to benefit somewhat from the Brexit vote, “as the dramatic fall in the value of the pound should make exporters more cost competitive, especially in European and US markets”.
The European market is a particularly important one for exporting offshore wind services to, with RenewablesUK showing that by far the majority of projects currently in development are based on the continent, with a particularly high concentration in Germany.
Separately to RenewablesUK’s report, the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), has published their own report, predicting that the offshore wind industry is set to grow by as much as 650% by the year 2030.
They cited a combination of fast improving technological development and rapidly falling costs as cause for the predicted boom. The biggest hurdle for offshore wind, and for renewable technology generally, has typically been the relatively high costs given the often relatively unreliable output levels compared with more established, fossil fuel burning forms of power generation. However now, as prices are falling sharply, offshore wind in particular is becoming more and more cost effective.
IRENA’s director, Adnan Amin said: “Offshore wind power is poised to become a leading power generation technology in a decarbonised global economy.
“Now that onshore wind power is cost-competitive with conventional power generation technologies, more attention is shifting to offshore applications, characterised by high technical power generation potential.”
