Scotland sold itself the sea for wind energy …. now he has nothing left
Photo by Nicholas Doherty on Unsplash
Scotland has auctioned parts of its seabed to wind energy companies, raising $ 951 million and boosting the country's renewable energy industry. nothing in hand was a good move.
As part of the auction, 17 projects were selected from 74 applications for a seabed area totaling 7,000 km2 under the Scottish Government's Sectoral Maritime Plan. This marks the first offshore leasing round in over a decade. Scottish Power Renewables invested $ 194.2 million across multiple sites, while Shell spent nearly $ 161.2 million on a 2,000 MW site. BP Alternative Energy Investments and SSE Energy have also invested, each offering $ 116 funds to build 2,907 and 2,610 MW projects. The total potential energy of these auctions is equivalent to powering around 23 million homes in the UK annually.
By laying the foundation for companies to establish up to 25 GW of offshore wind capacity, Scotland hopes to rapidly expand its renewable energy sector. Currently, the UK produces around 10 GW of offshore wind, with plans to expand this figure to 40 GW by 2030. The auction proceeds will return to the Scottish Consolidated Fund to finance the Scottish government. Additionally, the successful bidders agreed to invest approximately $ 1.34 in materials and services from Scotland for every 1 GW of offshore wind capacity, supporting local companies.
Scottish Power CEO Keith Anderson explained: "This is a colossal investment opportunity that could be the largest industrial investment in Scotland's history." It also highlighted the potential for tremendous opportunities for universities and technology innovators to work alongside the wind energy industry.
As the UK commits to shifting from fossil fuels to renewable alternatives, aiming for net zero carbon by 2050, this marks an important moment in change. Scotland hopes to reach net zero independently even earlier, by 2045, with the goal of reducing its main greenhouse gas emissions by 75% by 2030.
Despite the generally positive response to auctions, some wonder whether Scotland is losing control of its resources by leasing its seabed to foreign companies rather than founding a national wind power company. Common Weal, a pro-independence think tank, believes Scotland is "repeating the mistake" of its oil history by selling the rights rather than setting up a national energy giant to manage its energy portfolio.
Common Weal's Craig Dalzell said: “If Scotland had launched a national energy company capable of owning ScotWind, it would have been in a good position to deliver billions of profits to Scotland each year which will now be shipped overseas to private shareholders instead. Or invested in the public services of those countries that have deployed their nationalized companies in Scotland ”. in the end, control passes to the usual energy multinationals and the Scottish people remain as spectators
Instead, in this way, the control of Scottish energy resources is entrusted, for the umpteenth time, to some foreign companies. Even if there will be royalties, the energy will still be theirs. One day the government may regret it …
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The article Scotland sold itself the sea for wind energy…. now it no longer has anything comes from ScenariEconomici.it .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/la-scozia-si-e-venduta-il-mare-per-lenergia-eolica-adesso-non-ha-piu-nulla/ on Thu, 27 Jan 2022 10:00:47 +0000.