The multinational oil and gas company, Statoil, recently announced their plan to build five floating wind turbines off the Scottish coast after gaining approval from the Scottish Government.
With construction set to begin in 2016, this new wind farm will be the first of its type in the UK, consisting of five 6MW turbines capable of producing power for up to 20,000 homes.
There are currently three types of floating wind turbine. The first is the 'Blue H' turbine; a prototype of which has been in operation since 2008 and is installed off the Southern coast of Italy. The second type is the 'Hywind' turbine, which will be used for the Scottish floating wind farm; the first prototype started operating off the coast of Norway in 2009. In 2011, the third type of floating turbine came into operation, known as the 'Windfloat' turbine, the prototype is installed off the coast of Portugal.
These turbines differ from traditional offshore technology because they attach to the seabed using an anchoring system, rather than directly drilling the tower into the ocean floor.
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| Proposed Hywind Floating Wind Farm, Scotland Source: Statoil |
In a study published earlier this year, Rodrigues et al. (2015), outlined the benefits of floating turbines:
1. They can be placed in far deeper water than traditional turbines which can only be located in depths up to 50m; as a result, floating wind farms will be exposed to stronger and less turbulent winds than those seen near the coast. With floating turbines further away from the coastline, there will be a reduced visual impact which should decrease the controversy surrounding new proposals.
2. There are decreased environmental impacts because piling is not required for installation. As I outlined in my previous post, this was a key downside of offshore wind turbines but with floating turbines this issue could potentially be avoided in future.
3. There are far more suitable locations and these farms can be much larger in size to meet greater energy demand.
However, there are also issues involved when using floating turbines. These are mostly design related, resulting from increased wind and wave movement further out at sea. But, as we have seen with all renewable technologies, increased research and investment should reduce these problems in time.
There seems to be a strong future for floating wind turbines, with construction underway for new developments and other proposals confirmed. This summer, Japan completed work on the world's largest floating turbine of 7MW capacity, located off the Fukushima coast; the project followed on from the pilot 2MW turbine that was installed in 2013. In addition to this news, earlier this year, Portugal announced plans to build a new floating wind farm off their north coast. It will consist of four turbines with total capacity of 25MW and should be fully operational by 2018.
These are just some of the global developments of this technology and with Statoil calling the Scottish wind farm a 'pilot', hopefully more floating turbines will be seen off the UK coast in future.
Interesting! Thinking, if we are woking to reduce fossil fuel and go renewal, then we should strat being quite familiar with many hydra like wind wheel floating in the sea,
ReplyDeleteYes, hopefully we will see many more projects like this, not just in the UK, but on a global scale
DeleteVery exiting development! Having worked last summer at Gwynt y Mor, the second largest operating offshore windfarm in the world, I came to realise how short the operating lives of projects like these really are, only a couple of decades or so. Hopefully, floating turbines will make an appearence in Britain soon.
ReplyDeleteAgreed, 20 years isn't a particularly long time, but I read that energy companies hold leases for the sites for a much longer period, which makes it easier to install new turbines.
DeleteWith costs decreasing an more research in the area, hopefully operating time will start increasing, but floating turbines are certainly an exciting development!