Caledonia wind farm developers reveal plans for onshore connection
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Plans for a new offshore wind farm in the Moray Firth have taken another step forward with the release of details about how the project will link to the mainland.
The 2GW Caledonia Offshore Wind Farm is being developed by Ocean Winds in the Moray Firth, to the east of the Beatrice, Moray West and Moray East sites, and could have as many as 150 turbines.
A newly published scoping report outlines proposals for the onshore transmission infrastructure that will connect the wind farm to the National Grid.
The infrastructure will consist of an underground cable landfall site on the west Aberdeenshire coast, a new electricity substation in the vicinity of New Deer and an underground cable route connecting the two.
Caledonia representatives visited Wick in November as part of a short series of public consultation events. Other sessions took place in Fraserburgh and Buckie.
The site was awarded to Ocean Winds under the Scottish Government’s ScotWind process and the development is expected to come online in 2030. A decision has yet to be made on where the wind farm will have its operations and maintenance (O&M) base.
In the meantime, the scoping report has been submitted to Aberdeenshire Council and pre-application consultation events will be held in the area in the spring.
Catarina Rei, head of development for Caledonia Offshore Wind Farm, said: “Caledonia is one of the few ScotWind projects which is geographically able to use AC transmission, rather than the DC technology needed to overcome significant distances from shore. That means Caledonia can proceed at pace to supply Scotland with local low-cost, low-carbon electricity.
“With the exception of the substation, all of the onshore transmission infrastructure will be underground, so after completion it will not be visible. The scoping report identifies a broad corridor for the cable route, which will be refined as part of the environmental impact assessment process and through local engagement.
“We will publish details of a series of pre-application consultation events in the spring to provide the opportunity to discuss our proposals with local communities.
“We have been developing offshore wind generation in the Moray Firth for over a decade, and we pride ourselves in securing high-quality planning consents. The scoping report is the first stage in that process, and we look forward to engagement and discussions with our stakeholders to maintain those high standards.”
Speaking at last month's Wick consultation event, Caledonia wind farm spokesman Craig Milroy said: “Any power station needs an operational staff.
"We constructed a new O&M base for Moray East [in Fraserburgh], we're constructing another O&M base for Moray West [in Buckie]. O&M facilities will be required for Caledonia.
“All of these create permanent, high-quality jobs that are required for as long as the wind farm is producing power.
“What we can say is that we have a history of creating new facilities to look after wind farms. We make a fairly big commitment to establishing ourselves as a new opportunity in the places that we come to.
“That pipeline of projects means that there's a pipeline of opportunities. We have confidence that Caledonia is going to be one of the most rapid of the ScotWind projects to build."
Ocean Winds, which has its headquarters in Madrid, is the result of a 50-50 joint venture by EDP Renewables and Engie.
Ocean Winds' Moray East Offshore Wind Farm came online in 2021, while Moray West is under construction and is due to be operational by 2025.
Beatrice is operated by the joint venture partnership Beatrice Offshore Windfarm Ltd and was officially opened in 2019.
