Scotland announced a project worth £2.2 million to cut the cost of offshore wind.
First Minister Alex Salmond announced this project under the Carbon Trust’s Offshore Wind Accelerator (OWA) program, a joint industry and government scheme that brings together nine offshore wind developers.
The OWA will receive £200,000 in 2014/15 and £2,000,000 in 2015/16.
The project money will be used for, encouraging international collaboration between the world’s leading offshore wind developers to address cost reduction challenges in Scottish waters, share knowledge on foundations and installations, operations and maintenance and support the commercialization of floating offshore wind turbines for Scottish waters.
On the occasion of a meeting with Carbon Trust representatives and OWA program held at Aberdeen, the Minister said, “Scotland has set a new record in 2013 for renewables generation which has accelerated into 2014 with new record levels of renewables generation showing 56 percent growth over the year in 2014.”
The government target is to generate the equivalent of 100 percent of Scotland’s annual electricity consumption from renewable sources by 2020. Renewable energy is valuable to Scotland’s economy, to reducing carbon emissions as well as jobs and long term investment. Scotland is home to many offshore wind resource and government support its development as part of the energy mix. Scotland supports Offshore Wind Accelerator program as part of the renewables development strategy, explained the Minister.
Tom Delay, CEO, Carbon Trust, said, “Carbon Trust, in partnership with Scottish Government will drive further cost reductions in the offshore wind industry. The sector has potential to generate low carbon power. Rapid driving of costs down through innovation is necessary. The OWA and this new injection of funding will be key to help meet this cost reduction challenge.”