Iberdrola To Build 400-MW Baltic Offshore Wind Farm  

REW has an article on some large scale offshore win power developments in Europe - Iberdrola To Build 400-MW Baltic Offshore Wind Farm.

Iberdrola Renovables has bought 100% of the rights to build the Ventotec Ost 2 offshore wind complex in the German zone of the Baltic Sea. The rights were purchased from a German joint venture comprising Deutsche Erneuerbare Energien GmbH and Ventotec GmbH. They were awarded the permit in 2007.

The Ventotec Ost 2 offshore wind complex is far along in the permitting process and is expected to be commissioned by 2014. The wind farm’s 80 wind turbines, each with a capacity of of 5 megawatts (MW), are expected to generate a total of 1,200 gigawatt-hours (GWh).

The project is located in the northern part of the priority wind area known as Westlich Adlergrund, and will be built approximately 40 kilometers from shore. The average depth of the water is approximately 39 meters.

The German government has set a target of installing at least 10,000 MW of offshore wind capacity by 2020 and Iberdrola recently created an Offshore Wind Division designed to channel the development of this significant volume of offshore wind power.

Recently, Iberdrola and Vattenfall were awarded the construction rights to build one of the largest offshore wind farms in the world in the United Kingdom. The North Sea zone, known as East Anglia Array, has the potential to develop up to 7,200 MW, with construction is expected to begin in 2015.

The company is also involved in the development of several further offshore projects in Germany and has a pipeline of 2,300 MW in the United Kingdom, including the 500-MW West of Duddon Sands facilities, which it will start construction onin 2012, and Argyll Array, which will have an installed capacity of up to 1800 MW.