Orsted was also awarded a 2.4GW CfD for Hornsea 4. Rasmus Errboe, of Orsted, said: “We look forward to delivering these landmark projects, which will supply renewable power at a large scale to UK consumers and businesses and help the UK Government achieve its target of quadrupling offshore wind capacity to 60GW by 2030.”
ScottishPower, owned by Spanish utility giant Iberdrola, has been offered contracts for another two large wind farms, East Anglia Two and East Anglia Three. As with Orsted, it was allowed to move its East Anglia Three project out of the contracts signed under a previous and less lucrative auction into this year’s round.
Keith Anderson, the chief executive of ScottishPower, said: “Offshore wind is back on track after last year’s misstep.
“This auction’s success shows this tried and tested investment mechanism, replicated globally, delivers exactly the scale of action needed, with billions of pounds to be pumped into the British economy replacing ageing, polluting infrastructure.”
However profits from ScottishPower’s projects will go to Iberdrola’s shareholders – largely in Spain.
Responding to today’s CfD auction AR6 results, Emma Pinchbeck, Energy UK’s chief executive, said: “AR6 represents a crucial step in the journey to clean power by 2030. As we recover from an energy crisis caused by our exposure to international fossil fuel prices, it’s more important than ever that we build a clean energy system that can ensure our energy security and protect homes and businesses across the country from unaffordable energy bills.”
She added: “This is by far the cheapest way to power the UK.”
Claire Coutinho, the shadow energy secretary, said: “I welcome the 5GW of offshore wind contracted in the latest renewable auction which I started last year.
“Under the Conservatives, Britain built more offshore wind than any other country bar China, thanks to the competition enabled by CfDs – which the Conservatives introduced in 2014.”
John Constable, director of Renewable Energy Foundation, a UK charity publishing data on the renewables sector, said: “Ed Miliband is spending consumer funds on a scale that is as reckless as it will be eye-wateringly painful. Billions in new subsidies on an offshore wind industry that was only recently claiming to have slashed costs, billions to make nuclear viable in markets distorted by wind and solar, and yet more in charges to pay for grid and constraint payments.”
He concluded: “This cannot end well.”