England To Favour Domestic Manufacturers For Wind Subsidies

The British Government will not allow subsidies for offshore wind development projects that do not use components made and supplied by UK based manufacturers. The new rules are likely for projects larger than 300 MW.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has announced plans to grow UK offshore wind generation to 40GW by 2030, with an additional investment of  $28bn in UK industry.

In doing this, the UK simply joins the broader European push to maintain the continent’s lead in wind technology, especially offshore wind, before that too is taken up by China, as happened with solar. Readers will recall that with China finally ramping up win energy plans, with the ‘normal’ bias towards domestic firms, Wind energy manufacturers  have been preparing for a strong Chinese challenge in this segment too. European and some American firms have so far been among the leaders in Wind Energy, especially in offshore wind, while in onshore, Chinese firms have already made strong inroads.

The UK, with the highest offshore wind generation capacity worldwide for now, has so far been seeing almost all European firms do the heavy lifting of building up the infra.

While earlier,  subsidy schemes would have assessed project supply chains at their date of commissioning, now assessment of supply chain implementation would be done just before CfD (Contract For Difference) payments begin. The UK’s next CfD auction is due in December.

The government hopes that the new moves will push local sourcing from approximately 30 percent at present to over 60 percent by 2024.