Orsted on number of turbines for Isle of Man windfarm
Orsted on number of turbines for Isle of Man windfarm
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00:00I imagine one of the questions you may have had today, or may be on people's minds, if you look at the poll that you have online,
00:08it says up to 100 turbines could be developed, created, erected as part of this project.
00:16We're getting closer now to, I think, next year is when you'll be submitting the planning application, the end of quarter one.
00:22Have you got any clearer idea, John, of how many of those turbines, of those hundreds, will be there?
00:29Well, it depends on feedback, first of all, so I'll come back to my first point.
00:33Please fill in the feedback form and let us know what you think.
00:36I think it's important to just explain what we actually show in consultation.
00:40So what we've got in the visualisations, what we've got in the layouts, is the maximum design scenario.
00:46That is the maximum design we assess for the environmental impact that would have.
00:51So we see the size of the turbines, we see the number, up to 100.
00:55We see the layout, which has a dense border closest to the shore at the 6 nautical mile, the 11 kilometre limit.
01:01Those are all, if you like, the way it will look if we went down every avenue of doing the maximum design.
01:08We'll take the feedback, we'll look at the plans and refine them.
01:11We've planned that in our programme, so there's a reason consultation is happening this summer,
01:15because we need the time between the end of summer and that application next spring to refine and design what we'll put forward.
01:22I don't know on numbers of turbines what the outcome will be, because it also depends on conversations with other stakeholders we're having,
01:29whether that's fisheries, shipping, navigation, there's a lot of people in the marine space we've got to engage with
01:34and make sure we're satisfying any concerns they've got.
01:37But I am confident with the response we've had, that what we're bringing forward now,
01:43go back to 2015 when we got our agreement for lease, the assumption was we'd need 117 turbines to generate 700 or 800 megawatts of power.
01:52Thanks to the advance of technology, we can bring the number of turbines down,
01:56but double the output from the wind farm to 1.4 gigawatts,
01:59which means doubling revenue to the government, means doubling opportunities in taxation,
02:05means more technicians working from the Isle of Man on running the wind farm in operation.
02:10So perhaps it was worth the wait, you might say, to allow the industry to move on in that sense.
02:16But I certainly think the Isle of Man knows that this is the time to look at doing this,
02:20when we see what's happening in the neighbouring nations.
02:22These projects are happening already, and in the next 10 years we're going to see another leap forward
02:27in offshore wind farm development in the waters around the Isle of Man.
02:30So the question we're putting is, does the Isle of Man want to have its first offshore wind farm,
02:34serving the island and designed and built hopefully from the island?
02:38Interesting, so just to come back on that.
02:41In terms of, since you had the agreement placed with the government in 2015,
02:47you're saying technology, if I might, technology has moved on so much that you can now have
02:52probably less than predicted, but still create even more energy,
02:56based on what your assumption is in 2015. Is that correct?
03:00Yeah, I mean, so the way to look at it is that the turbines themselves, offshore turbines, have got larger.
03:05Now they've not got double in size, that's not how that works.
03:08I always give the example of the gearbox which we have in our head office in Denmark
03:13for the first offshore turbine we installed in 1991 in Denmark.
03:17We talk now about machines which are 10 times larger, but they have a 33% more in terms of output.
03:24That gives you a sense of the kind of scale of difference from those first turbines to today.
03:29So the difference between 2015 and now is that technology has moved on.
03:33Our maximum design scenario allows for some more movement,
03:36so perhaps larger machines than you might go and install today,
03:40because we've obviously got some more years to go until we install these.
03:43But the reality is that Elman's own energy strategy was all about getting the most from our natural resources.
03:49So we think the best way to do that is to use the most efficient machines at the time,
03:53allow them to run for the 35 year lifetime,
03:56and get the maximum benefit of the wind off the east coast of the island.