Irish energy firm plans £1.2 billion North Sea wind farm

Airtricity, the Dublin-based renewable energy specialist, is preparing an audacious plan to build the world’s biggest wind farm in the North Sea at a cost of about £1.2 billion. The Irish group is putting together a consortium of energy and construction partners to raise finance to develop the wind farm, which would be located in British waters. It aims to present its plans to the government later this year. Airtricity, which is backed by NTR, the largest multi-utility group in Ireland, has drawn up plans for a wind farm of about 5,000 turbines producing more than 10,000MW of electricity. Airtricity’s partners are likely to include a national grid operator, such as National Grid Transco, ScottishPower or Scottish & Southern Energy. One of the most expensive parts of the project would be the cost of linking the farm to the grid. The consortium will also include a power generation company, such as Centrica, Npower or Powergen, which would probably sign an agreement to buy the green energy produced by the turbines. The turbines would be spread over almost 50 square kilometres and create enough energy to power 441,000 homes.