The waters surrounding the UK have long played home to some of the world's most ambitious renewable energy projects, with a line of off-shore wind farms one-upping each other over the years to assume the mantle as the world's largest. The title will soon be changing hands once again, with construction now underway at Dogger Bank, a gigantic off-shore wind power facility being built to outsize them all.
As a sign of how quickly things are moving when it comes to wind power in the UK, consider that the 500-MW Greater Gabbard Offshore Wind Farm, with its 140 turbines, was the world's largest when it entered operation in 2008. The London Arrray with its 175 turbines and 630 MW capacity usurped it in 2013, before an extension of the Walney off shore wind farm outstripped it in 2018, with a set of 189 turbines and capacity of 659 MW.
The Dogger Bank Wind Farm near the coastal village of Ulrome in England is set to dwarf them all, with a capacity totaling 3.6 GW. A joint project between energy companies SSE Renewables and Equinor, the farm will actually be made up of three wind farm sites in the North Sea, generating 1.2 GW apiece.
At the center of the energy generation will be the world's most powerful wind turbine, the GE Renewable's Haliade-X. This turbine stands 260 meters (853 ft) tall and features three 107-meter (351-ft) blades, the longest off-shore blades ever made. Together, SEE Renewables says these turbines will provide enough power for more than 4.5 million homes every year, or around five percent of the UK's estimated electricity demand.
Construction is now underway, including vegetation clearing and roadworks for the onshore facility, which requires around 32 km (20 mi) worth of cabling. The project is slated for completion in 2022, with the team hoping to achieve first power in 2023.
“Getting the first spade in the ground is a significant milestone on any project, but for what will be the world’s largest offshore wind farm, this is a major moment for a project that has already been over a decade in the making," says Steve Wilson, Managing Director of Dogger Bank Wind Farms.
Source: SSE Renewables
UK needs a better mix of renewables such as tidal, extra wind is fine but its not the answer to a 100% reliable renewable source. .
See also 'This Car Is Powered By Salt Water: 920HP, Top Speed 217.5 MPH, 373 Miles/Tank' Captain Planet
Or this version of a water powered car that need to be initially fuelled with hydrogen from methane to get the process going, 'The tiny Welsh car that runs on hydrogen and emits only water' CNN
Others have claimed, like the Japanese company Genepax, to have created engine technology that does not even require any initial input of hydrogen, but whilst some may dispute the claims of Genepax, the sea water version is most definitely up and running and could be used to generate electricity to put into batteries or into the national grid.
The factories in China where the wind generators are manufactured are surrounded by acres and acres of deep, toxic black sludge that will ruin the land for all time in the foreseeable future.
The British invention of the non-toxic battery that can power a car for 1500 miles on one charge, that is one seventh the weight of current batteries and is based on aluminium and a completely non-toxic electrolyte solution that is completely recyclable, with the aluminium itself being able to be harvested from recycled aluminium cans, could actually be charged with power from water-powered generators instead.
If that idea was used, vast amounts of health-destroying airborne particulate matter from petrol and diesel combustion engines could be avoided, saving tens of thousands of lives each year in the UK alone and vastly improving the health of countless thousands of others.
Wind currents around Britain actually are not that reliable to produce regular output from wind-powered generators anyway.
See; 'Ex-Navy officer turned inventor signs a multi-million deal to produce his electric car battery that will take drivers 1,500 miles without needing to charge' Daily Mail.
See; 'In China, the true cost of Britain's clean, green wind power experiment: Pollution on a disastrous scale' Daily Mail
On a more basic level, solar and wind power generation cannot continue indefinitely until a practical energy storage scheme is implemented.
However, don't forget that the UK is connected to Europe with 4 stonking interconnectors (soon to be 5 and another nine at planning stage) which means that power generated here on a windy day can relatively easily (and profitably) be exported (and, of course, imported, too).