Greening Blue Energy - BioTools For Business

Offshore wind
energy overview
Nation Total capacity
(MW)
technology, material and human factors increase
due to the rough offshore environment. However,
these are increasingly being overcome. For example
the offshore park Alpha Ventus is installed 45 km off
the shore at 33m depth. In Italy, Japan and Norway,
No. of offshore
wind farms
Number of
turbines
UK 883 12 287
Denmark 639 9 305
Netherlands 247 4 130
Sweden 164 5 75
Germany 42 4 9
Belgium 30 1 6
Ireland 25 1 7
Finland 24 1 8
Norway 2 1 1
Japan 1 1 2
TOTAL 2057 38 830
Table 2: Offshore wind farms in operation around the world (adapted from EWEA (2009)
countries that all lack broad continental shelves,
floating wind power plants are being developed for
placement at 50 m to 400 m depth.
6 GREENING BLUE ENERGY - Identifying and managing biodiversity risks and opportunities of offshore renewable energy
2.2 Policy drivers
Renewable energy options are increasingly being
promoted in response to the global challenges
of climate change, depleting indigenous energy
resources, increasing fuel costs and the threat of
energy-supply disruptions. More than 75 countries
around the world have policies in place for renewable
energy. For example, the European Union has
a policy in place to reduce greenhouse gas emissions
by 20 per cent, increase renewable energy
provision to 20 per cent of primary demand, and
increase energy efficiency by 20 per cent by 2020.
A critical factor in the successful development of
wind energy is appropriate government support,
often involving feed-in tariffs, subsidies or tax
breaks to promote cleaner forms of energy.
In response to this policy trends and the need to
diversify portfolios, a large number of energy companies
are looking to expand the supply of renewable
energy.
Nevertheless, the European Commission (EC) has
identified challenges that must be overcome for the
further development of the offshore wind sector.
The challenges include:
• weaknesses in the overall framework
• industrial and technological challenges
• lack of integrated strategic planning