US $11.8 billion to be invested in offshore wind power

May 30 - Offshore Shipping Online - Addressing delegates at the All-Energy conference in Aberdeen last week, Douglas-Westwood (DWL) director Andrew Reid presented the findings of a new study of the growing offshore wind energy industry and highlighted significant growth, fast-rising costs and shifting market dynamics.

Offshore wind will see US$11.8 billion of capital expenditure in the coming five year period as 3.6GW of new capacity is installed. With just over 900MW of capacity currently installed, this represents significant market growth and will lead to an annual capital expenditure of over US$3.8 billion by 2011.

In addition, DWL forecast the value of the operations and maintenance market to reach US$350 million per year by 2011 with US$950 million to be spent in total over the next five years. Read More.