Europe’s largest operating onshore wind farm, Whitelee, was officially switched on yesterday by Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond.
Site owner Scottish Power has also won planning permission to increase generating capacity at the £300M, 322MW windfarm in East Renfrewshire by a further 130MW.
“Whitelee in its current form is already flying the flag for onshore wind power in Europe,” said Salmond.
“The planned extension, which I am delighted to announce today, will enable the windfarm to harness its comparative and competitive advantage in wind generated energy within Europe. It has the infrastructure, the expertise and the capacity to continue to develop in the future.”
In addition the granted 130MW upgrade, Scottish Power is carrying out scoping work on a potential second extension, which could add a further 140MW. It is anticipated that an official planning application will be submitted for this later in the summer. This would mean a total capacity of near 600 MW at Whitelee.
In its position 370m above sea level, 15km to Glasgow, there are over 500,000 people living within a 30km radius of Whitelee. This is one of the first major windfarms to be constructed close to large population centres, and an ever increasing supply of renewable energy has been fed directly into these areas since the site first started exporting power in January 2008.
As well as the physical construction of the turbines, the £300M project has also seen the creation of a 90km floating road network and the connection of over 970km of cables to link the turbines to the national grid. A £2M state-of-the-art visitor centre is also in the process of being completed.
There is now almost 6GW of renewables capacity installed, consented or under construction around Scotland.
The Scottish Government’s Energy Consents and Deployment Unit is currently processing 28 renewable project applications - 23 wind farms and five hydro projects.
In addition it has determined 28 energy applications, including approval for 22 renewable and one non-renewable project since May 2007 - more determinations than over the whole of the previous four years, in which 19 projects were determined.
“Whitelee in its current form is already flying the flag for onshore wind power in Europe,” said Salmond.
“The planned extension, which I am delighted to announce today, will enable the windfarm to harness its comparative and competitive advantage in wind generated energy within Europe. It has the infrastructure, the expertise and the capacity to continue to develop in the future.”
In addition the granted 130MW upgrade, Scottish Power is carrying out scoping work on a potential second extension, which could add a further 140MW. It is anticipated that an official planning application will be submitted for this later in the summer. This would mean a total capacity of near 600 MW at Whitelee.
In its position 370m above sea level, 15km to Glasgow, there are over 500,000 people living within a 30km radius of Whitelee. This is one of the first major windfarms to be constructed close to large population centres, and an ever increasing supply of renewable energy has been fed directly into these areas since the site first started exporting power in January 2008.
As well as the physical construction of the turbines, the £300M project has also seen the creation of a 90km floating road network and the connection of over 970km of cables to link the turbines to the national grid. A £2M state-of-the-art visitor centre is also in the process of being completed.
There is now almost 6GW of renewables capacity installed, consented or under construction around Scotland.
The Scottish Government’s Energy Consents and Deployment Unit is currently processing 28 renewable project applications - 23 wind farms and five hydro projects.
In addition it has determined 28 energy applications, including approval for 22 renewable and one non-renewable project since May 2007 - more determinations than over the whole of the previous four years, in which 19 projects were determined.
Source: New Civil Engineer
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