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Research programmes and test facilities (Session Code: BT1)

Track: TECHNOLOGY
Wednesday, 5 December 2007, 09:00 - 10:30




Chairs:
Sven-Erik Thor, Vattenfall, Sweden
Jos Beurskens, Energy Research Centre of the Netherlands (ECN), The Netherlands

 

CREATING THE TECHNOLOGY FOR OFFSHORE WIND IN SPAIN: EOLIA, THE WORLD'S LARGEST OFFSHORE WIND R&D PROGRAM 
Raul Manzanas, ACCIONA ENERGIA, Spain  
Download presentation: PowerPoint file | Download full paper: No file available 		BT1.1

Co-author(s):

Summary

Since the late 1990s, Spain has been a leader of the wind energy industry, with over 12GW installed. However the land-use and environmental pressures present in northern European countries are now also being felt in Spain and if wind energy is to have a long term future, wind turbines will soon need to be placed offshore. In 2007 the Spanish government created the necessary legislative and financial framework for offshore wind profitability and Acciona is leading the development of the technology within the EOLIA project, which, with a budget of ?34m, is the largest ever offshore wind Research project.

Full description

Spain has been a primary player in Onshore wind for several years now, however very little attention has been paid to the potential of Offshore wind as a renewable generation source. There have been numerous discussions, however the considerable local challenges in Spain meant that each time the same issues halted progress: high costs due to the deep waters, lack of technical experience, grid constraints, resistance from fishermen and lack of an appropriate tariff and legislative framework to deal with this new generation technology.

For the last two years, the Spanish government has been making efforts to change this situation by developing a new tariff scheme specifically for Offshore wind and creating a new regulation system for the allocation of sites within a competitive bidding process. The final details were announced during the last half year.

Because of the water depths, the technical challenges faced off Spain are even more arduous than off Germany, with depths passing 50m generally within a dozen kilometres off the shore. Until recently, the ambition to overcome this was lacking in Spain. However EOLIA project, with many major companies and research organisations taking part together with significant financial support from CDTI (a public organisation under the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism), shows that this has changed.

Following internal dialogue about Offshore wind between industry, government and research in Spain, in 2006 Acciona Energía brought together a consortium of 16 partners, each with a high degree of competence in the wind industry to create ?EOLIA?. This project was submitted for funding under the Spanish CENIT programme, which supports research activities with significant future potential. The purpose of EOLIA is to perform the research needed for the new technologies for offshore wind in deep waters, hence the scope needs to be broad, from the directly necessary technology: the support structures, cables, moorings, to the project development: the environmental impact, wind resource and planning, to the future applications and synergies: desalination and aquiculture.

The project?s total budget of 34MM? is being supported with 17MM? from CDTI. It started in 2007 and will be completed in 2010.

EOLIA comprises several companies from the Acciona Group (Energy, Wind Turbines, Desalination, Infrastructure, Engineering), together with major partners, as ABB, Construcciones Navales del Norte Shipyard, General Cable, Ingeteam Group, Ormazabal and Vicinay, and smaller partners such as Tinamenor and IMATIA, and the participation of research centres such as CENER.