Off-shore Wind Energy

Production and Distribution of Electricity and Heat

Wind turbines or wind electricity generators directly convert the wind energy into electricity. They can be installed on ground (on-shore wind turbines) or at sea (off-shore wind turbines) on low-depth coastal or on floating platforms. This publication deals with off-shore wind generators that currently are much less diffused than on-shore generators, but also hold a large potential for future installations. In the last twenty years, offshore wind energy widely spread all over the world: at the end of 2020, the installed rated capacity of offshore plants was 35.3 GW and the countries with the highest installed capacity were the United Kingdom (10.2 GW), China (10 GW), and Germany (7.7 GW). In Italy, no offshore plants are currently installed. In 2020, electricity generated by offshore farms in Europe supplied about 3% of total electricity demand. In the EU-27, this contribution was about 2%, with Denmark being the leading countries with a 19% share. In recent years, the Levelized Cost of Electricity (LCOE) of offshore wind power plants significantly reduced reaching the economic competitiveness vs. the electricity generation from fossil fuels, particularly in regions with good wind potential and conditions. This reduction has been achieved due to many factors such as the technology advances of the offshore wind turbines, the increase of the turbine size (8-9 MW for commercial turbines and up over 10 MW for new prototypes), and the huge reduction of subsystems and components costs of the offshore wind power plants

27-07-2022

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