Crown Estate Scotland announced the successful bidders to the first ScotWind development round, with 17 bidders named. In total, 24.8 GW of new capacity is expected to be developed, including 14.566GW of floating offshore wind.
In anticipation of this launch, the Scottish Offshore Wind Energy Council has been working to coordinate sector efforts to support Scottish supply chain growth.
It commissioned Professor Sir Jim McDonald to deliver the independent Strategic Investment Assessment (SIA), which set out priorities for investment to support Scottish supply chain growth. Since the publication of the SIA in August 2021, Scottish offshore wind companies have been working together to develop principles to guide future industry collaboration between offshore wind companies, Scottish ports and the wider supply chain.
SOWEC industry co-chair Brian McFarlane said:
“Today is an important milestone on Scotland’s journey to be a world-leading offshore wind supplier. ScotWind is a once in a generation opportunity and makes real Scotland’s ambition to lead global efforts to successfully transition to a low carbon economy. Offshore wind offers Scotland the opportunity to build a world-class supply chain.
“As part of the conditions of winning a lease, all developers will be asked to engage with the Scottish supply chain. Within SOWEC we have been working to ensure that we have a clear route to how the offshore industry can work collectively so that the sum of all this effort is greater than the individual parts. Our industry will continue its work on a collaborative framework and engage proactively with Scottish ports about their role in delivery.
“I am particularly pleased to see over half of capacity will be floating offshore wind. Scotland can use its subsea engineering and deepwater expertise to become a world leader in floating offshore wind, and these initial projects can help make this ambition real. In particular there is a real opportunity for Scottish ports and yards to win work supporting production of floating platform manufacture.”
Notes
- The results of the ScotWind leasing round can be found here.
- The Scottish Offshore Wind Energy Council (SOWEC) is a partnership between the Scottish public sector and the offshore wind industry. Co-chaired by Ivan McKee, Minister for Business, Trade, Tourism & Enterprise, and Brian McFarlane of SSE.
- SOWEC’s mission is to coordinate and grow the sector, ensuring the Scottish offshore wind industry is more sustainable, competitive, and commercially-attractive, both domestically and in the global offshore wind market.
- Strategic Investment Assessment
- The Collaborative Framework Principles - SOWEC will work with ScotWind winners to develop these principles and put in place a framework with Scottish ports, with an initial focus on supply of floating offshore wind platforms.
In addition, one 495MW project is proposing a mixed development using fixed and floating technologies.
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