Crown Estate Scotland (CES) has selected the Ørsted, Falck Renewables and BlueFloat Energy consortium to enter into an option agreement for a new floating offshore wind project off the north-east coast of Scotland.
The award for this floating wind site of up to 1GW in scale was one of many awards made as part of the Crown Estate Scotland ScotWind offshore wind leasing round.
Crown Estate Scotland announced the outcome of its ScotWind Leasing application process, which included 17 projects being offered option agreements that reserve the rights to specific areas of seabed covering just over 7,000km2.
A total of just under £700 million ($954 million) will be paid by the successful applicants in option fees and passed to the Scottish Government for public spending.
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The project awarded to the Ørsted consortium will be located off Caithness and is the energy company’s first large-scale floating wind development project anywhere in the world.
As part of the preparatory work, the consortium will collaborate with Energy Skills Partnership Scotland (ESP) to help train up a skilled workforce in time for construction to begin.
Martin Neubert, Chief Commercial Officer and Deputy Group CEO at Ørsted, says: “I commend Crown Estate Scotland for awarding lease rights at large scale and with focus on development phase commitments, which is exactly what is needed to allow for financially sustainable development and to make floating and deeper water wind cost-competitive.
“By securing this seabed lease area, we’re confirming our ambitions in floating offshore wind while expanding our offshore development pipeline and our long-term commitment to the UK.”
The 17 applicants who have been offered option agreements include:
Simon Hodge, Chief Executive of Crown Estate Scotland, said: “In addition to the environmental benefits, this also represents a major investment in the Scottish economy, with around £700m ($952m) being delivered straight into the public finances and billions of pounds worth of supply chain commitments.
“The variety and scale of the projects that will progress onto the next stages shows both the remarkable progress of the offshore wind sector, and a clear sign that Scotland is set to be a major hub for the further development of this technology in the years to come.”
Once these agreements are officially signed, the details of the supply chain commitments made by the applicants as part of their Supply Chain Development Statements will be published.
According to Crown Estate Scotland, this is just the first stage of many for these projects, which still need to navigate consenting, financing, and planning stages. Projects will only progress to a full seabed lease once all these various planning stages have been completed.
While projects progress, research will also need to be carried out with the Scottish Association for Marine Science (SAMS) to investigate the potential effects of floating wind developments on the marine environment.
ScotWind is a programme that will lease areas of the seabed around Scotland for wind farm developments. If successful, developers are granted the rights to build wind farms in Scottish waters.
Since the process began in June 2020, ScotWind has been an auction that the entire wind industry has kept a keen eye on and will deliver not only economic opportunities for the region, but also aid Scotland in reaching its net zero targets.
