05 August 2021

About the wind farm visited by Boris Johnson

05 August 2021

The wind farm visited by Boris Johnson will be able to provide 40% of Scotland’s energy.

But it has been criticised for snubbing UK manufacturers when awarding contracts to build the 100 turbines off the Scottish coast.

The Prime Minister, joined by Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng, set out into the Moray Firth to see the wind farm, which is still under construction, as it nears completion.

The Moray East Offshore Wind Farm will be able to provide 950MW of electricity to the National Grid network from the energy generated by its offshore wind turbines.

There are 100 turbines throughout the 295km2 site, built at least 22km off the Scottish coast.

The wind farm boasts that it will be able to provide 40% of Scotland’s electricity, or power up to 950,000 homes across the UK.

Construction began in 2010 and is expected to be completed by the end of August, although the wind farm started exporting power in June. Electricity will be sold at the equivalent of 5.75p/kWhr.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson (centre) and business minister Kwasi Kwarteng (right), meeting wind farm project investors and project delegates in Fraserburgh Harbour, Aberdeenshire (Jane Barlow/PA) (PA Wire)

It also claims that 1.7 million tonnes of CO2 emissions will be saved annually.

But the windfarm courted controversy when Scottish BiFab yards were overlooked for manufacturing contracts, with jobs going overseas.

Unions previously described the awarding of contracts for 100 turbine jackets to UAE fabricators Lamprell and Belgian steel constructors Smulders as an “absolute scandal”.

In a joint statement, GMB Scotland Secretary Gary Smith and Unite Scotland Secretary Pat Rafferty said the BiFab yards in Fife “could end up with nothing” from the Moray East and Kincardine projects because of a “spaghetti bowl of vested interest groups with established supply chains of preference”.

They added: “The truth is that state-funded European energy and engineering firms, backed by Far East finance and Middle East sovereign wealth funds, are carving-up thousands of jobs and billions of pounds from our renewables sector.”

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