Offshore wind power too expensive?

Author: MRE and CBL

A recent article at the BBC web site presents intersting data about the comparative costs of various means of clean electricity generation.

The turbines pictured above are now part of the Ormonde wind farm, built by Swedish-based energy firm Vattenfall. The site, located off the Cumbrian coast, has 30 of the five-megawatt turbines in total and should be able to power around 100,000 homes. By 2020 the government hopes that 15% of the UK's energy will come from renewable sources with wind energy making a key contribution.But although the UK has access to some of the world's best resources for producing wind energy, offshore wind farms remain an expensive way of producing electricity.

Professor Dieter Helm, an economist from the University of Oxford, told the BBC he doubted a large expansion in offshore wind power was affordable. He said: "Offshore wind is one of the very few things that makes nuclear power look cheap."

The graphic shown here refers to energy projects started in 2009. As time passes costs are expected to drop, the government hopes that offshore wind can reach £100/MWh by 2020. At a tme when the French government has so emphtically taken an interst in stimulating and developing our industry, it does no harm to pause for thought and remember that even if the costs fall as predicted, onshore wind will presumably also become cheaper, and nuclear on those figures remains competitive - although it is unlikely that the data includes the still unknown costs of decommissioning.

Source: BBC web site.