VIDEO: Iberdrola Commits to Offshore Wind

February 14, 2013

Iberdrola has identified offshore wind power as one of its key areas for future growth and it aims to lead the development of this technology going forward with the necessary caution for investments of this nature.

In order to achieve this objective, the Company has created an Offshore Business Department with offices in Glasgow, London, Berlin, Madrid and Paris. The Department will be responsible for the gradual implementation of its project portfolio, which currently totals around 8,000 megawatts (MW) in Europe.

These projects are currently under way in the waters of the United Kingdom, France and Germany, where they will provide a decisive boost to the economies of the areas in which they are located, as well as reactivating other sectors, such as the naval industry.

The Company’s main initiatives in this field are the following:

WEST OF DUDDON SANDS – UNITED KINGDOM

This is the Group’s most advanced project and will become the first offshore wind farm to come into operation, around the end of the year. Iberdrola is developing this project jointly with the Danish company, Dong. West of Duddon Sands will have a capacity of 389 MW, sufficient to supply the electricity needs of 300,000 British homes.

The company responsible for supplying the wind turbines is Siemens. In addition, two of the latest generation of seagoing vessels have been commissioned from two Danish companies, both of them leaders in the sector relating to offshore wind power, to assist in the plant’s construction. These two ships will transport and install all the infrastructure elements at the wind farm, bringing them from Belfast port to the open sea.

These are two of the most modern ships in the market and have been designed specifically for the installation of offshore wind farms, allowing work to be carried out throughout the year, even in the most extreme weather conditions. The two vessels are currently under construction and are expected to be ready by the end of the year.

Iberdrola and Dong are working on the facility from the port of Belfast (Northern Ireland). As a result, the port is undergoing the most important refurbishment and extension in its history, with record investment of 60 million euros. This work includes the construction of a new terminal covering an area of 200,000 square metres, which will be used for the assembly of all the components. This is the first terminal in a British port designed specifically for the assembly of offshore wind farms.

EAST ANGLIA – UNITED KINGDOM

The most ambitious offshore wind power project currently under way is the one in East Anglia, an initiative being completed jointly with the Swedish company, Vattenfall. An idea of the size of this project can be gained from the fact that the study phase alone has involved an investment of 62 million euros.

East Anglia will be one of the largest offshore wind farms in the world when it comes into operation in 2015, with a capacity of 7,200 MW. The planned installed capacity will mean that it will be able to supply electricity to five million homes and contribute substantially to the United Kingdom’s renewable energy targets in its attempts to combat climate change.

SAINT-BRIEUC – FRANCE

Another of the projects to have seen great advances in recent months is the Saint-Brieuc facility, off the French coast.

The contract for the Saint-Brieuc facility, which will have a capacity of 500 MW, was awarded by the French government to a consortium formed by Iberdrola and EOLE-RES. The facility will be located off the bay of the same name, in the Côtes d’Armor region of France, around 20 kilometres out to sea.

To develop the project, the consortium has created the company Alas Marinas and engaged a number of French companies that are leaders in the offshore wind power field.

More specifically, the company Areva will manufacture the facility’s wind turbines at its factory in Le Havre and will also be responsible for maintaining the turbines. Technip will lay the undersea cables, while STX and Eiffage will build the foundations and platforms on which the turbines will stand. Finally, Neoen Marine will complete the environmental studies, a key factor in a facility of this size.

WIKINGER – GERMANY

The Wikinger facility will be located in German waters in the Baltic Sea and will have an installed capacity of 400 MW.

Iberdrola expects to present the final plans for this offshore project at the beginning of 2014, with a view to commencing construction in 2015 and feeding the first kilowatts of power into the network in 2016.

Wikinger will be located in the northern section of the area known as Westlich Adlergrund, which the German authorities have designated as a Priority Offshore Development Area and which lies around 40 kilometres out to sea, the nearest land being the island of Rügen. The average depth of the waters here is around 39 metres.

Iberdrola is also leading the development of R&D in offshore wind power. The Company’s projects are focused, on the one hand, on reducing generating costs using this technology in the short-term and, on the other, designing technologies that can be installed in deeper waters using floating platforms in the long term. This will make it possible to expand the development of offshore wind generation in the future to countries where deep seas currently make this kind of facility unviable, as is the case with Spain and other countries in southern Europe.

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