| Facilitating The Expansion Of The European-Wide Offshore Wind Supply Chain For The Next Round Of Government Action |
Enabling the development and growth of the offshore wind supply chain will be essential to sustain the rapid expansion of UK offshore wind energy generation over the next decade.
In the UK, for instance, as the government’s allocation of £100 billion for the development of Round 3 offshore wind farms demonstrates, offshore wind is now an essential area of industrial development, but wind turbines on this scale have never yet been implemented so far offshore and in such quantities, posing significant strategic challenges for their production.
Globally, and in the UK in particular, co-ordination between all the key stakeholders is now needed to overcome the logistical and strategic challenges for the manufacture and installation of offshore wind farms and in their integration into the grid.
The emerging offshore wind industry needs clarity on its future direction, to understand how regulatory bodies and governments are going to support it long-term, if offshore wind farms and the offshore grid are going to become a commercially viable reality.
How are financing and risk going to be managed long-term? The public allocation of spending is a clear signal to kick-start the industry but both private investors and government need offshore wind projects to be financially attractive investments. How will public-private partnerships play a role in the long-term financing of offshore wind farms?
Bringing manufacturing to the UK: Action and interest have been sparked in the supply chain, but before scaling up their operations, suppliers need to have a real commitment from government and regulators (as well as developers themselves) that this industry will receive long-term support. This will be particularly important in order for the UK to compete in the European offshore wind industry as a nation.
The North Sea Super-Grid: countries around the North Sea have now committed on paper to realising the idea of a North Sea Super-Grid, which will make use of spare capacity in the cables and create an integrated European energy market.
However, coordinating different European regulatory frameworks for offshore wind energy will be a critical step towards overcoming the strategic challenges posed by the North Sea Super-Grid. By bringing together regulatory bodies around the North Sea with the offshore wind industry, this conference will facilitate the coordination process.
| Gaining Regulatory Clarity For Both Offshore Wind Development And Grid Integration |
This is the first Summit of its kind to focus purely on strategic and regulatory solutions:
- enabling the UK’s offshore wind supply chain development
- the implementation of the North Sea Super-Grid
- the long-term financing of offshore wind projects
- the development of a competitive UK supply chain
This conference will be a high-level discussion between government, regulators including Ofgem and European regulators, Round 3 developers, The Crown Estate and the supply chain, to deliver practical solutions for enabling supply chain development. It will provide more certainty and confidence that regulatory frameworks can provide a long-term stable system for the offshore wind industry, allowing manufacturers to increase capacity with the guarantee of future ROI.
- Analyse government incentives and frameworks for enabling the supply chain, gaining the confidence for when, where and how to scale-up in preparation for the rapid expansion of the offshore wind industry
- Coordination of all the stakeholders: hear from the National Grid, Ofgem and European TSOs as well as regulators from Belgium, Ireland, the Netherlands and Denmark, on the vision for an efficient and reliable system for offshore wind development
- Understand how the OFTO regime can manage the transmission assets linking offshore wind farms to onshore grids
- Financing and risk are key concerns for the emerging developers of offshore wind energy: hear how third party investors will play a role in mitigating and sharing risk
By bringing together the key decision-makers, this Summit will provide the industry with valuable know-how; who to go to in what sectors, how to break into the industry with the right tools and the right contacts, and ultimately, the clarity on regulatory frameworks they need to get a foothold in the industry.
| Focusing On Strategic Solutions For The Supply Chain |
The high-level regulatory discussions will serve the industry by removing some of the barriers and creating some of the opportunities necessary for rapid supply chain development in specific supply chain sectors:
- Resourcing people, skills and expertise: synthesising government incentives, training programmes and universities to scale-up the resource of skilled personnel in the wind energy industry
- Installation vessels: with only a handful of suitably equipped vessels currently in operation, manufacturers need the confidence to increase their capacity now
- Turbine manufacture: hear how turbine manufacturers plan to increase capacity and lifecycles for turbines and how this will impact the supply chain
- Foundation design and construction: understand how the government plans to incentivise the manufacturing that the UK economy so desperately needs
- Subsea cable manufacture and installation: solutions for timing and coordination
- Onshore infrastructure: learn how governments and port owners envisage the critical development of ports
For the first time this Summit will align all of the key decision-makers in the regulation, financing and grid integration aspects of offshore wind development, supplying the industry with the solutions it needs to successfully coordinate the scaling-up of the offshore wind supply chain.
|
