Wind power in the United Kingdom

Burbo Bank Offshore Wind Farm.

The total offshore wind power capacity installed in the United Kingdom as of February 2019 is 8,483 MW, the largest in the world. The United Kingdom became the world leader of offshore wind power generation in October 2008 when it overtook Denmark.[52] In 2013 the 175-turbine London Array wind farm, located off the Kent coast, became the largest offshore wind farm in the world; this was surpassed in 2018 by the Walney 3 Extension.

The United Kingdom has been estimated to have over a third of Europe's total offshore wind resource, which is equivalent to three times the electricity needs of the nation at current rates of electricity consumption[53] (In 2010 peak winter demand was 59.3 GW,[54] in summer it drops to about 45 GW). One estimate calculates that wind turbines in one third of United Kingdom waters shallower than 25 metres (82 ft) would, on average, generate 40 GW; turbines in one third of the waters between 25 metres (82 ft) and 50 metres (164 ft) depth would on average generate a further 80 GW, i.e. 120 GW in total.[55] An estimate of the theoretical maximum potential of the United Kingdom's offshore wind resource in all waters to 700 metres (2,300 ft) depth gives the average power as 2200 GW.[56]

The first developments in United Kingdom offshore wind power came about through the now discontinued Non-Fossil Fuel Obligation (NFFO), leading to two wind farms, Blyth Offshore and Gunfleet sands.[57] The NFFO was introduced as part of the Electricity Act 1989 and obliged United Kingdom electricity supply companies to secure specified amounts of electricity from non-fossil sources,[58] which provided the initial spur for the commercial development of renewable energy in the United Kingdom.

Offshore wind projects completed in 2010–11 had a levelised cost of electricity of £136/MWh, which fell to £131/MWh for projects completed in 2012–14 and £121/MWh for projects approved in 2012–14; the industry hopes to get the cost down to £100/MWh for projects approved in 2020.[19] The construction price for offshore windfarms has fallen by almost a third since 2012 while technology improved and developers think a new generation of even larger turbines will enable yet more future cost reductions.[59] In 2017 the UK built 53% of the 3.15GW European offshore wind farm capacity.[60] In 2020, Boris Johnson pledged that, by the end of the decade, offshore wind would generate enough energy to power every UK home.[61]

In 1998 the British Wind Energy Association (now RenewableUK) began discussions with the government to draw up formal procedures for negotiating with the Crown Estate, the owner of almost all the United Kingdom coastline out to a distance of 12 nautical miles (22.2 km), to build offshore wind farms. The result was a set of guidelines published in 1999, to build "development" farms designed to give developers a chance to gain technical and environmental experience. The projects were limited to 10 square kilometres in size and with a maximum of 30 turbines. Locations were chosen by potential developers and a large number of applications were submitted. Seventeen of the applications were granted permission to proceed in April 2001, in what has become known as Round 1 of United Kingdom offshore wind development.[62]

The first of the Round 1 projects was North Hoyle Wind Farm, completed in December 2003. The final project, Teesside, was completed in August 2013. Twelve Round 1 farms in total are in operation providing a maximum power generating capacity of 1.2 GW. Five sites were withdrawn, including the Shell Flat site off the coast of Lancashire.[63]

Four offshore wind farms are in the Thames Estuary area: Kentish Flats, Gunfleet Sands, Thanet and London Array. The latter was the largest in the world from April 2013 to September 2018.

Delivery of UK's longest onshore turbine blades. 58.7m blades for 145m GE 2.75–120 wind turbines at Muirhall Wind Farm.[64]

Lessons learnt from Round 1, particularly the difficulty in getting planning consent for offshore wind farms, together with the increasing pressure to reduce CO₂ emissions, prompted the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to develop a strategic framework for the offshore wind industry. This identified three restricted areas for larger scale development, Liverpool Bay, the Thames Estuary and the area beyond the Wash, called the Greater Wash, in the North Sea. Development was prevented in an exclusion zone between 8 and 13 km offshore to reduce visual impact and avoid shallow feeding grounds for sea birds. The new areas were tendered to prospective developers in a competitive bid process known as Round 2. The results were announced in December 2003 with 15 projects awarded with a combined power generating capacity of 7.2 GW. By far the largest of these is the 900 MW Triton Knoll.[65] As before a full Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) would be needed along with an application for planning consent.

The first of the Round 2 projects was Gunfleet Sands II, completed in April 2010 and six others are now operational including the London Array, formerly the largest wind farm in the world. Four other Round 2 sites are currently under construction.[63]

Scroby Sands wind farm from Great Yarmouth

In May 2010 the Crown Estate gave approval for seven Round 1 and 2 sites to be extended creating an additional 2 GW of offshore wind capacity.[66] Each wind farm extension will require a complete new planning application including an Environmental Impact Assessment and full consultation. The sites are:[67]

• Burbo Bank and Walney: DONG Energy UK.
• Kentish Flats and Thanet: Vattenfall.
• Greater Gabbard: SSE Renewables and RWE Npower Renewables.
• Race Bank: Centrica Renewable Energy.
• Dudgeon: Statoil and Statkraft.

Following on from the Offshore wind SEA announced by the Government in December 2007, the Crown Estate launched a third round of site allocations in June 2008. Following the success of Rounds 1 and 2, and important lessons were learnt - Round 3 was on a much bigger scale than either of its predecessors combined (Rounds 1 and 2 allocated 8 GW of sites, while Round 3 alone could identify up to 25 GW).

The Crown Estate proposed 9 offshore zones, within which a number of individual wind farms would be situated. It ran a competitive tender process to award leases to consortia of potential developers. The bidding closed in March 2009 with over 40 applications from companies and consortia and multiple tenders for each zone. On 8 January 2010 the successful bidders were announced.

Following the allocation of zones, individual planning applications still have to be sought by developers. These are unlikely to be completed before 2012 and as such the first Round 3 projects are not expected to begin generating electricity before 2015.

During the bidding process, there was considerable speculation over which companies had bid for the zones. The Crown Estate did not make the list public and most of the consortia also remained silent. The successful bidders for each zone were eventually announced as follows:[68]

In 2009, during the Round 3 initial proposal stage 26.7GW of potential capacity was planned. However, due to government planning permission refusal, challenging ground conditions and project financing issues a number of proposed sites were withdrawn. A number of other sites were also reduced in scope.

Round 4 was announced in 2019 and represented the first large scale new leasing round in a decade. This offers the opportunity for up to 7GW of new offshore capacity to be developed in the waters around England in Wales.[75] This is split into four bidding areas:

• Dogger Bank
• Eastern Regions
• South East
• Northern Wales and Irish Sea

The tenders are under review and the Agreements for Lease will be announced in Autumn 2021.

The UK has accelerated its decommissioning of coal power stations aiming for a 2024 phase-out date,[76] and recent European Nuclear power stations have encountered significant technical issues and project overruns that have resulted in significant increases in project costs.[77] These issues have resulted in new UK Nuclear projects failing to secure project financing. Similarly, SMR technology is not currently economically competitive with offshore wind in the UK. Following the Fukushima nuclear disaster public support for new nuclear has fallen.[78] In response, the UK government increased its previous commitment for 40 GW of Offshore wind capacity by 2030.[79] As of 2020, this represents a 355% increase over current capacity in 10 years. It is expected the Crown Estate will announce multiple new leasing Rounds and increases to existing bidding areas throughout the 2020-2030 period to achieve the governments aim of 40 GW.

In addition to the 25 GW scoped under the Round 3 SEA, the Scottish Government and the Crown Estate also called for bids on potential sites within Scottish territorial waters. These were originally considered as too deep to provide viable sites, but 17 companies submitted tenders and the Crown Estate initially signed exclusivity agreements with 9 companies for 6 GW worth of sites. Following publication of the Scottish Government's sectoral marine plan for offshore wind energy in Scottish territorial waters in March 2010,[80] six sites were given approval subject to securing detailed consent. Subsequently, 4 sites have been granted agreements for lease.[81]

The complete list of sites including power updates and developer name changes:

The Ardrossan Wind Farm in North Ayrshire, Scotland

Specialist trailers deliver turbine components to Dorenell Wind Farm.[181]

The first commercial wind farm was built in 1991 at Delabole in Cornwall;[182] it consisted of 10 turbines each with a capacity to generate a maximum of 400 kW. Following this, the early 1990s saw a small but steady growth with half a dozen farms becoming operational each year; the larger wind farms tended to be built on the hills of Wales, examples being Rhyd-y-Groes, Llandinam, Bryn Titli and Carno. Smaller farms were also appearing on the hills and moors of Northern Ireland and England. The end of 1995 saw the first commercial wind farm in Scotland go into operation at Hagshaw Hill. The late 1990s saw sustained growth as the industry matured. In 2000 the first turbines capable of generating more than 1 MW were installed and the pace of growth started to accelerate as the larger power companies like Scottish Power and Scottish and Southern became increasingly involved in order to meet legal requirements to generate a certain amount of electricity using renewable means (see Renewables obligations below). Wind turbine development continued rapidly and by the mid-2000s 2 MW+ turbines were the norm. In 2007, the German wind turbine producer Enercon installed the first 6 MW model ("E-126"); The nameplate capacity was changed from 6 MW to 7 MW after technical revisions were performed in 2009 and to 7.5 MW in 2010.

Growth continued with bigger farms and larger, more efficient turbines sitting on taller and taller masts. Scotland's sparsely populated, hilly and windy countryside became a popular area for developers and the United Kingdom's first 100 MW+ farm went operational in 2006 at Hadyard Hill in South Ayrshire.[183] 2006 also saw the first use of the 3 MW turbine. In 2008 the largest onshore wind farm in England was completed on Scout Moor[184] and the repowering of the Slieve Rushen Wind Farm created the largest farm in Northern Ireland.[185] In 2009 the largest wind farm in the United Kingdom went live at Whitelee on Eaglesham Moor in Scotland.[186] This is a 539 MW wind farm consisting of 215 turbines. Approval has been granted to build several more 100 MW+ wind farms on hills in Scotland and will feature 3.6 MW turbines.

As of September 2013, there were 458 operational onshore wind farms in the United Kingdom with a total of 6565 MW of nameplate capacity. A further 1564 MW of capacity is currently being constructed, while another 4.8 GW of schemes have planning consent.[43]

In 2009, United Kingdom onshore wind farms generated 7,564 GW·h of electricity; this represents a 2% contribution to the total United Kingdom electricity generation (378.5 TW·h).[187]

Large onshore wind farms are usually directly connected to the National Grid, but smaller wind farms are connected to a regional distribution network, termed "embedded generation". In 2009 nearly half of wind generation capacity was embedded generation, but this is expected to reduce in future years as larger wind farms are built.[188]

Gaining planning permission for onshore wind farms continues to prove difficult, with many schemes stalled in the planning system and a high rate of refusal.[189][190] The RenewableUK (formerly BWEA) figures show that there are approximately 7,000 MW worth of onshore schemes waiting for planning permission. On average, a wind farm planning application takes 2 years to be considered by a local authority, with an approval rate of 40%. This compares extremely unfavourably with other types of major applications, such as housing, retail outlets and roads, 70% of which are decided within the 13- to 16-week statutory deadline; for wind farms the rate is just 6%. Approximately half of all wind farm planning applications, over 4 GW worth of schemes, have objections from airports and traffic control on account of their impact on radar. In 2008 NATS en Route, the BWEA, the Ministry of Defence and other government departments signed a Memorandum of Understanding seeking to establish a mechanism for resolving objections and funding for more technical research.

Wind farms in the UK often have to meet a maximum height limit of 125 metres (excluding Scotland). However, modern lower cost wind turbines installed on the continent are over 200 metres tall.[191] This planning criteria has stunted the development of onshore wind in the UK.

A Scottish government spokesman has said electricity generated by renewables accounted for 27% of Scotland's electricity use. On the night of 5–6 April 2011, the wind in Scotland was high, it was raining heavily, which also created more hydroelectricity than normal. The grid became overloaded preventing transmission of the electrical power to England, as a result the electrical wind power generation was cut. Wind farms operators were paid compensation known as "constraint payments"[236] as a result (a total of approximately £900,000) by the National Grid, estimated at twenty times the value of electricity that would have been generated. A spokesman for the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC), described the occurrence as unusual, and noted it demonstrated a need for greater energy storage capacity and better electrical power distribution infrastructure.[237][238][239] The payment of 'constraint payments' to wind energy suppliers is one source of criticism of the use wind power and its implementation; in 2011 it was estimated that nearly £10 million in constraint payments would be received, representing ten times the value of the potential lost electricity generation.[240] Wind farm constraint payments have increased substantially year on year reaching a record of £139 million in 2019.[241] Nevertheless, constraint payments are a normal part of operating the UK grid, and similar amounts are also paid to each of gas, coal and other generators.[242][243]

There is some dispute over the necessary amount of reserve or backup required to support the large-scale use of wind energy due to the variable nature of its supply. In a 2008 submission to the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee, E.ON UK argued that it is necessary to have up to 80–90% backup.[244] Other studies give a requirement of 15% to 22% of installed intermittent capacity.[231] National Grid which has responsibility for balancing the grid reported in June 2009 that the electricity distribution grid could cope with on-off wind energy without spending a lot on backup, but only by rationing electricity at peak times using a so-called "smart grid", developing increased energy storage technology and increasing interconnection with the rest of Europe.[245][246] In June 2011 several energy companies including Centrica told the government that 17 gas-fired plants costing £10 billion would be needed by 2020 to act as back-up generation for wind. However, as they would be standing idle for much of the time they would require "capacity payments" to make the investment economic, on top of the subsidies already paid for wind. In 2015/2016 National Grid contracted 10 coal and gas-fired plants to keep spare capacity on standby for all generation modes, at a cost of £122 million, which represented 0.3% of an average electricity bill.[247]

Grid scale battery storage is being developed in order to cope with the variability in wind power. As of 2020, there are no operational large scale Grid storage batteries.

With the increase in proportion of energy being generated by wind on the UK grid, there is a significant reduction in synchronous generation. Therefore, in order to ensure grid stability, the National grid ESO is piloting a range of demand side and supply side frequency response products.[248]

Wind power is Scotland's fastest growing renewable energy technology, with 5328 MW of installed capacity as of March 2015. This includes 5131 MW of onshore wind and 197 MW of offshore wind.[274]

Whitelee Wind Farm near Eaglesham, East Renfrewshire is the largest onshore wind farm in the United Kingdom with 215 Siemens and Alstom wind turbines and a total capacity of 539 MW.[275] Clyde Wind Farm near Abington, South Lanarkshire is the UK's second largest onshore wind farm comprising 152 turbines with a total installed capacity of 350 MW.[276] There are many other large onshore wind farms in Scotland, at various stages of development, including some that are in community ownership.

Robin Rigg Wind Farm in the Solway Firth is Scotland's only commercial-scale, operational offshore wind farm. Completed in 2010, the farm comprises 60 Vestas turbines with a total installed capacity of 180 MW.[277] Scotland is also home to two offshore wind demonstration projects: The two turbine, 10 MW Beatrice Demonstrator Project located in the Moray Firth, has led to construction of the 84 turbine, 588MW Beatrice Wind Farm set to begin in 2017 and the single turbine, 7 MW Fife Energy Park Offshore Demonstration Wind Turbine in the Firth of Forth. There are also several other commercial-scale and demonstration projects in the planning stages.[278]

The siting of turbines is often an issue, but multiple surveys have shown high local community acceptance for wind power in Scotland.[279][280][281] There is further potential for expansion, especially offshore given the high average wind speeds, and a number of large offshore wind farms are planned.

The Scottish Government has achieved its target of generating 50% of Scotland's electricity from renewable energy by 2015, and is hoping to achieve 100% by 2020. The majority of this is likely to come from wind power.[282] This target will also be met if current trends continue [283][284]

In July 2017 work commissioning an experimental floating wind farm known as Hywind at Peterhead began. The wind farm is expected to supply power to 20,000 homes. Manufactured by Statoil, the floating turbines can be located in water up to a kilometre deep.[285] In its first two years of operation the facility with five floating wind turbines, giving a total installed capacity of 30 MW, has averaged a capacity factor in excess of 50% [286]

• 
  Whitelee Wind Farm with the Isle of Arran in the background.
• 
  Clyde Wind Farm
• 
  Ardrossan Wind Farm from Portencross, just after sunrise