Offshore wind energy is a promising sector of renewable energy sources

The beginning of offshore wind energy was laid in Europe in 1991 the first offshore wind farm (Windebi) was installed in Denmark. The advantage of offshore wind power compared to onshore wind is a higher power factor due to its location in areas with stable and strong winds, limited impact of noise on the landscape.

In 2021 the world experienced a global increase in the installed capacity of offshore wind  farms (WPP) which accelerated almost 3 times compared to 2020 and amounted to 17.3 GW. The main contribution was made by China (14.7 GW), aboutsteel 2.6 GW mainly fell on the Netherlands, Denmark and Vietnam. To date the largest offshore wind farms are Borssele 1.48 GW-170 turbines (Netherlands), Hornsea Project One with a capacity of 1.2 GW-174 turbines (UK), in October 2021 GE Renewable Energy will use a pile in Rotterdam, a prototype of the world’s largest offshore wind turbine with a capacity of 14 MW. A number of wind farms are in construction or design. The total installed capacity of coastal wind farms in the world by the end of 2021 reached 50.1 GW. The share of the UK is 21%, Germany and the Netherlands – 15% and 6%, Denmark and Belgium – 5% each. It is expected that by 2050 the installed capacity of offshore wind power in the world will reach 1550 GW.

The EU’s goal is to increase offshore wind capacity by a factor of 10 to 300 GW by 2050. An example is the Agreement between Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands and Belgium on the creation of a wind farm with a capacity of 65 GW in the North Sea by 2030 and on their basis, it is envisaged to form an integrated network connected to the whole of Europe. Most existing offshore wind farms use wind turbines on stationary foundationsof various structures at a depth of up to 50-60 meters.

One of the achievements of the offshore industry is the development and deployment of turbine technology on a floating foundation, which ensures the use of wind potential in deep-water areas (more than 50-60 meters). Hywind Scotland, the first commercial floating offshore wind farm with a capacity of 30 MW of 5 Siemens wind turbines was built and commissioned in 2017. 29 km from the coast of Scotland by the Norwegian oil and gas concern Equinor. The UK plans to increase the capacity of such power plants to 1 GW by 2030.

There are a few economic and technological problems in the field of offshore wind farms. For example, the cost of installing and operating offshore wind farms exceeds up to 2.5-3 times the cost of building and operating onshore wind farms. With the cost of a turbine at only one-third to one-half of total costs, the rest comes from infrastructure, maintenance and supervision. At the same time, the experts predict that due to the optimization of production costs and an increase in the capacity of turbines in this sector until 2050 prices will decrease by 37 – 49%. Important problems are the duration of hydro and wind farms, the choice and implementation of technologies for integrating offshore wind farms into the onshore network, the compliance of wind turbine installations with the norms of national and international legislation, the impact on water biosphere.