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Giant Thames Estuary wind farm gets green light

18/12/2006

Approval has been granted for the world's largest wind farm to be built in the Thames Estuary.

Two farms will be built by London Arrary and Thanet following the green light from the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI).

They will jointly provide 1.3GW of green electricity; enough to power a third of London's three million households.

The renewables obligation, which was introduced in 2002, requires electricity suppliers to source an increasing percentage of their electricity sales from renewable energy. In July this year the energy review proposed increasing this target to 20 per cent.

Trade and industry secretary Alistair Darling said that the two farms would make "a significant stride" towards achieving this target.

London Array's wind farm will consist of 341 turbines and will be located 20km off the Kent and Essex coasts stretching between Margate and Clacton.

Thanet, led by the Warwick Energy, will build a wind farm 11.3km from North Foreland on the Kent coast. Its 100 turbines are expected to deliver enough energy for 240,000 homes in 2008.

Announcing the DTI's decision today, Mr Darling said: "Achieving rapid growth in offshore renewables is essential if we are to reduce carbon emissions and improve the security of our energy supplies."

And environment secretary David Miliband added: "We expect this announcement will be the first of a number of large-scale offshore wind farms in the UK and will provide real impetus for the continued developments in the offshore renewable energy sector that will benefit generations to come.

"By issuing the licences to build the world's largest offshore wind farms in the Thames Estuary we are re-enforcing the UK's commitment to renewable energy and combating climate change and ocean acidification."

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