The Guardian has an article on a new British design for offshore wind turbines with a 275m wingspan that produce three times power of standard models - Engineers race to design world's biggest offshore wind turbines.

British, American and Norwegian engineers are in a race to design and build the holy grail of wind turbines – giant, 10MW offshore machines twice the size and power of anything seen before – that could transform the global energy market because of their economies of scale.

Today, a revolutionary British design that mimics a spinning sycamore leaf and which was inspired by floating oil platform technology, entered the race. Leading engineering firm Arup is to work with an academic consortium backed by blue-chip companies including Rolls Royce, Shell and BP to create detailed designs for the "Aerogenerator", a machine that rotates on its axis and would stretch nearly 275m from blade tip to tip. It is thought that the first machines will be built in 2013-14 following two years of testing.

But the all-British team of designers and engineers, which includes Eden project architects Grimshaw, is in stiff competition with other groups. Earlier this year US wind company Clipper, which has close ties with the US Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory, announced plans to build 10MW "Britannia" turbines in north-east England.

Based on a scaled-up version of the conventional wind turbines now common in the British landscape, these giants would be fixed to the sea bed but would stand nearly 600ft high above the waves. If they prove technically and financially feasible, each turbine should be able to generate enough electricity to provide 5,000-10,000 homes and, says Clipper, should create energy equivalent to 2m barrels of oil in their 25-year lifetime.

Meanwhile, Norwegian firm Sway is planning to build massive floating turbines that would stick straight out of the sea from 100m-deep floating "masts" anchored to the sea bed. An EU-sponsored research project is also investigating 8–10MW turbines, and other American and Danish companies are planning 9MW machines. Full-scale prototyes of all three leading designs are expected to be complete within three years.

"There is a wonderful race on. It's very tight and the prize is domination of the global offshore wind energy market," said Feargal Brennan, head of offshore engineering at Cranfield University, where much of the Aerogenerator development work has been carried out.

"The UK has come late to the race, but with 40 years of oil and gas experience we have the chance to lead the world. The new [Aero-generator] turbine is based on semi-submersible oil platform technology and does not have the same weight constraints as a normal wind turbine. The radical new design is half the height of an equivalent [conventional] turbine," he said. He added that the design could be expanded to produce turbines that generated 20MW or more.

The recent upswing in people talking about peak oil in the mainstream media continues, with Arup head Philip Dilley being quoted by the Scotland Herald - Peak oil theory could become a stark reality.

“Within five years we think peak oil is going to affect every aspect of our daily lives,” warned Philip Dilley, chairman of engineer Arup, yesterday. We are set for shortages and rising prices. And just to cheer you up, gas is probably going the same way too.

It all sounds familiar. The concept of “peak oil”, the stresses caused when oil production stops increasing, has been kicking around since the 1950s. ...

But the membership of the UK Industry Taskforce on Peak Oil and Energy Security, whose report Dilley was introducing, suggests these concerns are reaching the mainstream and business is getting anxious.

As a man known more for his fondness for pursuing commercial space flights and his airline brand than his love of the environment, Virgin Group founder Sir Richard Branson makes an unlikely green advocate.

As do others, including Ian Marchant, chief executive of Scottish Hydro Electric owner Scottish & Southern Energy and Brain Souter, founder and boss of transport firm Stagecoach.

Published yesterday, the taskforce’s second report (their first in autumn 2008 sank without trace because we were too busy worrying about our banks going bust) was notable for the starkness of some of its conclusions.

As the global economy expands, oil demand could rise from 80 million barrels a day to 120 million barrels a day by 2030. It could hit 180Mb/d by 2050. Yet the scope for production increases is limited.

Arup director John Motes said: “There may be a huge amount of oil in the ground, we are not saying there isn’t. But there is a limit to the rate at which we can extract it.”

This is because much of the stuff is in the form of tar sands or inaccessible locations such as Antarctica where it is time consuming and expensive to get the stuff out of the ground.

Currently around 80Mb/d comes out of the ground, the report found. But the taskforce is sceptical that this can get much above 92Mb/d.