The accelerating offshore wind market represents a unique opportunity for other industries like the Maritime and Oil & Gas sectors to transfer their offshore know-how and industrial capabilities to the offshore wind energy market. As offshore wind projects are developed further from shore and in deeper waters, this experience will be valuable for the further development of the offshore wind energy industry.
The offshore wind power sector is seen as a major renewable energy growth market. The latest studies expect that by 2020, Europe’s operating offshore wind power generation capacity will be 40 GW. EWEA’s most recent statistics for the European offshore sector point to a vibrant future for the industry. In 2012, 293 new offshore wind turbines, in 9 wind farms, representing investments of around €3.4 bn to €4.6 bn, were fully grid connected, totalling 1,166 MW, 33% more than in 2011. Average offshore wind farm size was 271 MW in 2012, 36% more than the previous year. The trend towards larger projects is expected to continue over the coming years.
That opens up enormous business fields for the maritime sector, for example in laying foundations, building transformer stations, installation and maintenance of turbines, and laying marine cables. The shipbuilding and marine equipment industries are well placed in these activities thanks to their existing expertise.
The close connection between these two sectors will be addressed in the conference programme at EWEA OFFSHORE 2013 which takes place in Frankfurt in November. Participants will be able to experience the latest developments in the growing electricity-generating sector while getting a glimpse of its vast potential.
Conference highlights include:
- New market opportunities in Europe
- New installation vessels, for turbines or foundations
- Synergies with other maritime technologies
- Synergies and combined use of space
- Supply chain: the contribution to offshore wind cost reduction
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