Seabed Power Grid To Connect North Sea Wind Turbines

A vast power grid on the seabed of the central North Sea is being planned as part of a £20bn project to power oil and gas platforms with green electricity.

Cerulean Winds won the rights to develop projects aimed at reducing the use of gas by offshore installations.

It aims to link more than 400 offshore turbines with the high voltage cables.

The company says the plan will involve 10,000 jobs, many of which could be in the supply chain in Scotland.

It hopes to have the infrastructure in place by 2028.

Dan Jackson, chief executive of the developer, said Scotland was among the most investable countries in the world for floating wind farms.

His company has formed a consortium of partners with experience in the sector, including NOV, Siemens Gamesa, Siemens Energy, DEME and Worley.

Hundreds of turbines are due to be installed in the next ten years in 20 sea areas included in the ScotWind round of developments, some of them fixed to the seabed and some anchored to it with cables.

ScotWind will link to the onshore National Grid. Energy firms have paid £755m to Crown Estates Scotland, which duly passes the funds to the Scottish government, for the rights to develop.

The Cerulean Winds project for an offshore subsea grid is part of another round called Innovation and Targeted Oil and Gas (Intog), which covers an element of innovation in technology but mostly provides renewable power to oil and gas installations to reduce their use of gas to power their operations.