Offshore staff
LONDON — The UK government is considering changes to its Contracts for Difference (CfD) mechanism for supporting new low-carbon electricity generation projects, including offshore wind developments.
Since the first auction was staged in 2015, the per unit (MWh) price of offshore wind in UK waters has fallen by almost 70%, the government claimed.
Currently, CfDs are awarded based on the bid price submitted by renewable energy generating stations, the aims including increased deployments.
The government is now inviting evidence and views on reviewing applications not just in terms of their potential for low-cost renewable energy, but also to determine how a planned project could benefit the renewable energy sector more widely.
So applicants may be asked to take into account overall costs alongside supply chain sustainability, addressing skills gaps, innovation and enabling system and grid flexibility and operability.
More investment in supply chain sustainability, the government said, could help the supply chain reduce its carbon impact and access the resources and materials needed to deploy sustainability at scale in the longer term.
Investments in skills would help train the technicians to deploy future larger renewable energy installations.
If the response to the Call for Evidence leads to identification of the need for changes to the CfD scheme, the government would open a consultation on more detailed proposals.
Last month, the government committed a further budget of £205 million ($254 million) to the scheme for the fifth allocation round (AR5).
04.17.2023
