A dozen European countries made a pledge today to build 100 GW of new wind power capacity as a means of reducing the consumption of oil and gas. For the first time, the planned wind installations will be linked to multiple countries, the BBC reported.
The group, featuring the UK, Ireland, Germany, Norway, the Netherlands, France, Iceland, Belgium, and Luxembourg, will build the large-scale wind projects jointly, per plans, as reported by Reuters. It is worth noting, however, that an earlier target for wind power, set in 2023, called for 300 GW in capacity to be built by 2050.
“We are standing up for our national interest by driving for clean energy, which can get the UK off the fossil fuel rollercoaster and give us energy sovereignty and abundance,” the UK’s net-zero minister, Ed Miliband, said, as quoted by Reuters.
“By planning expansion, grids and industry together and implementing them across borders, we are creating clean and affordable energy, strengthening our industrial base and increasing Europe’s strategic sovereignty,” Miliband’s German counterpart, Katherina Reiche, said.
According to proponents of the idea, the new wind capacity should lower electricity bills, even though the massive deployment of wind and solar across Europe has failed to have any positive effect on electricity affordability so far. Yet critics, as reported by the BBC, note that the operators of the new wind projects would be able to pick their buyers thanks to the interconnectedness of the installations, meaning they would in fact drive electricity prices even higher.
“We cannot escape the fact that the rush to build wind farms at breakneck speed is pushing up everybody’s energy bills,” UK’s shadow energy secretary Claire Coutinho said. On the other hand, the deputy chief of industry lobby group RenewableUK argued that the projects would lower electricity costs and boost “the energy security of the UK and the whole of the North Sea region significantly”.
By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com
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