Massive wind farms planned in Bristol Channel and Anglesey

Two new wind projects – one site in Bristol Channel and the other nine miles off the Anglesey coast – are among the nine offshore wind farms to be built in the UK.

Costing £100 billion, the new wind projects will be much bigger than anything to date in the UK. Experts say that the project will generate 60,000 more jobs.

Recently, nine wind farm zones within the UK waters had been awarded by the UK government to successful bidders . The combined project sites are expected to be one of the largest wind farm projects in the world. However, there are concerns over how the funding will be produced and the expense of maintaining wind farms so far-off the coast.

The Bristol Channel’s 1.5GW project, which is to be named Atlantic Array, will be developed by RWE Npower. The wind farm, which will be built around 11 miles off the southern coast of Wales, will have around 250 turbines.

Paul Coffey, Chief Operating Officer of RWE, said that the building of Atlantic Array will help meet the UK’s renewable energy targets, mitigate the impacts of climate change and improve energy security.

Meanwhile, Centrica Renewable Energy will develop the Anglesey wind farm in the Irish Sea. The company informed that the project could generate enough energy for over three million homes.

Sarwjit Sambhi, Managing Director of Centrica, said that developing the project in the Irish Sea could significantly boost renewable energy output. However, he added that offshore wind farms are costly to build and will require a long term, stable support to make the investment commercially feasible.