Scotland builds world's largest floating wind power plant

The world's largest floating wind power plant is set to start construction this year off the west coast of Scotland.

The turbines are anchored 100 metres below the seabed. Photo: Statoil ASA.

According to IFL Science, the wind power plant named Hywind Scotland Pilot Park, located about 25 km east of Peterhead, operated by Norwegian energy company Statoil, is expected to have a capacity of 30 MW.

Statoil has operated a floating turbine off the coast of Norway since 2009. However, Hywind is the first to build five floating turbines in the same area. Each floating turbine will produce 6MW of power, enough to power 20,000 homes by the end of 2017.

Size comparison of a turbine with Big Ben clock tower. Photo: Statoil ASA.

The advantage of floating turbines is that they can be placed in deeper water than land-based turbines. Coastal wind power plantsoftenare limited to depths of no more than 40 m below sea level, deeper locations would increase the associated costs. Instead, by anchoring turbines on concrete-filled steel tubes on the seabed, they can be located at depths of 100 m, allowing turbines to be located over a larger area.

The idea of ​​moving wind farms far out to sea is gaining traction, as higher wind speeds allow for more energy to be captured than plants closer to shore. More than 40 projects are in development to create floating wind farms. The world’s largest single-engine wind turbine was inaugurated near Fukushima, Japan, while another is expected to go into operation off the coast of Portugal in 2018.

Offshore wind farms offer much greater potential profits due to strong winds. Photo: Statoil ASA.

It is estimated that more than 90% of onshore wind power plants are installed in Northern Europe, and the European Union has set a target of producing 20% ​​of its electricity from this renewable energy source by 2020 due to the large potential of floating wind power plants. Floating wind power plants are also on the rise in other parts of the world, such as Japan, China and the United States.

According to VNE