UK’s Crown Estate Backs More Wind Turbines at Offshore Sites

(Bloomberg) -- King Charles III’s Crown Estate has given the green light to developers to build higher-density wind farms on existing seabed leases as it seeks a quick, space-efficient way to bolster capacity.

The announcement from the Crown Estate, which owns the UK’s seabed, means that seven projects including RWE AG’s Rampion 2, as well as SSE Plc’s and Equinor ASA’s Dogger Bank D, will be able to boost capacity by 4.7 gigawatts. This comes as the UK seeks to increase its wind capacity from 15 gigawatts to about 50 gigawatts.

Boosting wind farms’ output is key to Energy Secretary Ed Miliband’s plan, and was touted as a way to deliver lower energy bills at the last election. The goal of having a lower cost, clean power grid by 2030 is looking more challenging after Denmark’s Orsted A/S on Wednesday canceled plans to build a huge wind farm in the North Sea.

All the projects affected have existing grid connections, meaning that their additional output can be harnessed relatively quickly. Expanding capacity at these sites could cause some environmental harm, but the developments will be accompanied by compensation measures to address impacts on marine habitats and species.

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