Vattenfall and Aberdeen Renewable Energy Group (AREG), partners of Aberdeen Offshore Wind Farm Ltd, the company behind the European Offshore Wind Deployment Centre (EOWDC), welcomed today’s Supreme Court decision.
Andy Paine, Project Director for AOWFL, said: “This is another significant step forward for the EOWDC. It affirms the scheme’s potential to position Scotland, and particularly the North-east, as a centre of innovative offshore wind power. The project partners remain committed to seeing the EOWDC come to fruition and delivering long-term economic benefits to the region.”
Aberdeen City Council has been working closely with EOWDC project partner, AREG, and has a long standing commitment to the development. Council Leader, Councillor Jenny Laing, said: “We welcome the Supreme Court ruling regarding the EOWDC which is a project with enormous potential for Aberdeen and the wider north-east region.
“Both Aberdeen City and Aberdeenshire councils are today approving a Regional Economic Strategy which outlines a ‘Renaissance’ scenario for the local economy in the next 20 years, in which we maximise the recovery of remaining oil and gas reserves from the UK Continental Shelf while diversifying into other sectors including renewables, tourism, food and drink, agriculture and life sciences.
“The EOWDC is an example of the type of development that could help to deliver significant and long-term economic benefits to the region and help to cement Aberdeen’s reputation as a global energy city and a world-leading centre for innovation. This is why the EOWDC has been a long-standing priority for AREG and this council.”
The EOWDC is a ground-breaking new facility which is widely recognised as important to building Scotland’s future energy infrastructure. The strategic importance of the project is further underlined by the award of a European Union grant of up to €40million funding under the €4billion European Economic Programme for Recovery.
The 11-turbine scheme, located off the Aberdeen coast, will have an installed capacity of up to 100MW. Over 12 months, this capacity would be capable of yielding, on average, enough clean, green electricity to power the equivalent of more than 68,000 UK households. The EOWDC would help position the north east of Scotland as a global centre of offshore wind power innovation and will be important to its enterprising Energetica initiative, especially during challenging times for the North Sea oil and gas industry.