Offshore Wind Wire

Wind farms in Japan proved more resilient than the country’s nuclear plants, as none of the country’s eleven onshore and offshore wind farms suffered damage as a result of the massive earthquake and tsunami that ravaged the country, EnergyDigital.com reported.

Most impressively, the Kamisu offshore wind farm survived unscathed despite being just 186 miles from the epicenter of the disaster.

“There has been no wind facility damage reported by any [Japan Wind Energy Association] members, from either the earthquake or the tsunami” said Yoshinori Ueda, head of the International Committee of the Japan Wind Power Association & Japan Wind Energy Association, according to www.energydigital.com.

Japan’s electric grid did suffer damage, however, and caused three of the wind farms to be temporarily taken offline while the grid was repaired.

In another direct comparison between wind and nuclear power, the European Union’s climate chief recently announced that offshore wind generated electricity is actually less expensive than nuclear, the Guardian reported.

“Some people tend to believe that nuclear is very, very cheap, but offshore wind is cheaper than nuclear. People should believe that this is very, very cheap.” said Connie Hedegaard, Climate Change Commissioner of the EU, from the European Wind Energy Association’s annual conference in Brussels.

The Scottish Government’s latest plan for offshore wind sites off the country’s coast surprised many by listing six potential sites rather than the nine that had originally been called for. Sites at Kintyre, Solway Firth and Wigtown were dropped from the plan because of potential environmental and economic impacts.

“Marine Scotland officials held two rounds of consultation workshops in the local communities around the proposed sites to ensure the views of the public and other local interests were accurately heard,” said Rural Affairs and Environment Secretary Richard Lochhead explaining the decision, according to Energy Efficiency News. “Views raised at these meetings and 856 formal consultation responses were taken into account during decision making.”

The three eliminated sites had all drawn interest from developers – E.ON had been planning a 300 MW development at Solway Firth, while DONG Energy had plans for a 280 MW wind farm in Wigtown Bay. Scottish and Southern Energy had previous withdrawn from plans to develop the Kintry site, citing poor winds.