North-east of England could become wind power 'capital city'

By Paul Eccleston
Last Updated: 5:01pm BST 20/10/2008
The north-east of England should become the 'capital city' of the UK's booming wind industry, experts have said.

It would act as a magnet for industry, investment and skills in the same way that Aberdeen did for the North Sea oil industry.

Wind turbines: The north-east is where most of the offshore wind farms will be sited
A wind industry hub would encourage supply chains and assembly and bring overseas turbine manufacturers into the UK creating thousands of new jobs.Dr Gordon Edge of the British Wind Energy Authority (BWEA) said the north-east would be a natural choice because it was on the edge of the North Sea where most of the offshore wind farms will be sited.It was also close to Newcastle and Durham universities and the Renewable Energy Centre at Blyth, in Northumberland and had existing port facilities on Teeside.
"It is a probably the favourite although Lowestoft and Great Yarmouth may also be contenders," said Dr Edge, the BWEA's director of economics and marketing."But if we don't make a decision soon on where it should be we run the risk of the industry becoming fragmented and other countries will move in."
Gordon Brown will make a keynote speech at the opening of the BWEA's 30th anniversary annual conference in London tomorrow in a specially recorded video in which he will support a massive expansion in the UK's wind energy programme.
The conference is expected to hear that wind now supplies more than 3GW - about 2.5 per cent - of the 75GW electricity capacity bringing the UK up the fifth place in the European league table.

This is enough to supply 2m homes and saves about 3.5 tonnes of CO2 which would have been produced by conventional gas and coal fired power stations.
The UK has now overtaken Denmark as the largest offshore wind energy generator in the world and within five years will outstrip nuclear energy in terms of generating capacity.
Within the next decade 40GW of power in Europe will come from offshore wind farms and about 50 per cent of the total will be in British waters.The BWEA says the UK is on target to get 10 per cent of its electricity from renewable sources by 2010 but the demanding target of getting 15 per cent of all its energy from renewable sources will mean 35 per cent of electricity coming from renewables by 2020.
The industry is confident that it can supply 33GW - almost half of all electricity currently produced - by 2020 if obstacles such as planning delays can be overcome.
Wind power is a key element of the Government's energy strategy because more than one-third of our generating capacity will be lost within the next eight years as old power stations are taken off-line. And a new generation of nuclear plants and clean coal plants fitted with carbon capture technology will not be ready for at least another decade.
Without developing alternative and sustainable sources Britain will be forced to rely increasingly on imported gas from often unstable regions.The switch to renewable energy has so far cost £750m-£800m adding £9 to the average consumer's annual power bill.
The BWEA claims that at its most dynamic the wind industry could attract almost £50bn of investment, create 50,000 jobs and by 2010 earn Britain a 50 per cent share of the European market. But it needed the Government to create a strong policy framework to ensure adequate investment and better incentives and training to meet a skills shortage especially for electrical engineers.
It also called on the Government to free-up the log jam of planning applications for wind farms. Applications currently took an average of two years, more than half were subject to appeals and 7GW of capacity was stuck in the planning system.
Billions of pounds also needed to be spent upgrading and reconfiguring the National Grid to take electricity from the new sustainable industries.
"The industry is poised and waiting but we need a step change for 2020 and a signal from the Government to push on," said Dr Edge.