Wind Energy Planning

ScottishPower Renewables (SPR) nearly doubled its electricity output during 2009, producing over 1.7 million megawatt hours (MWh) of electricity from its 23 operational windfarms. The rise of 43.8% on 2008 figures meant that SPR produced enough green electricity to power the average annual needs of over 375,000 homes.

Last year, the company completed the construction of Europe’s largest onshore wind farm, Whitelee, near Glasgow.  The wind farm extends over an area the size of the city of Glasgow itself.

The Scottish Government has also granted planning consent for two extensions to Whitelee, which will increase the maximum output from the windfarm to 593MW.  In addition other wind farm companies including Coriolis Energy and Community Wind Power are proposing further Whitelee extensions.

SPR has a growing interest in offshore wind energy with a stake in the 500MW West of Duddon Sands project and development rights to a site west of Argyll and the island of Tiree which have the potential to generate between 500MW to 1800MW of electricity.

Director of SPR Keith Anderson said: “2009 was a landmark year for ScottishPower Renewables. Not only did we complete the largest windfarm in Europe, but we also laid the foundations for our expansion into offshore wind.

“We ended the year with a pipeline of over 5,000MW and have already announced our ambitions to co-develop the 7200 MW East Anglia Array offshore project. As part of the largest wind energy company in the world, ScottishPower Renewables has the support and ambition to continue to be a leader in renewable energy in the UK.”

SPR is part of Iberdrola Renovables.  The company had over 800 MW of installed capacity at the end of 2009, and a working pipeline of 5,115 MW.

SPR’s Spanish parent company Iberdrola produced a combined 21.5 million MWh of renewable energy during 2009, an increase of 26% on the previous year.  Of the total, 20.9 million MWh were produced by the company’s windfarms, 560,000 MWh at its small-scale hydro plants and 21,000 MWh from other technologies.

9.6 million MWh of Iberdrola’s electricity was generated from its Spanish Wind Farms, 7.7 million MWh from its US wind farms, 1.7 million MWh from UK wind farms and 1.7 million MWh from wind farms located in the rest of the world.