Port’s plea for realism on power
GOVERNMENT ambitions to build 25GW of offshore wind power by 2020 could present a golden opportunity for Hartlepool dock to become a “centre of excellence” in the handling of large project cargos.
However ministers needed to inject a “degree of realism” into their plans if they were to be realised, said PD Ports’ group development director Martyn Pellew, pictured.
He was among 100 port operators, developers, investors and wind manufactures attending this week’s heavily trailed meeting with energy minister Mike O’Brien designed to bolster the Government’s wind farm plans.
With just 11 years to achieve one of the most testing construction projects every undertaken in the UK, though, Mr Pellew said there was still a huge disconnect between policy targets and what was needed on the ground to reach them - including major investment in electricity networks.
This week’s meeting was called to cut through a potential bottleneck in offshore wind farm development, which the Government estimates to be worth £1bn for UK ports up to 2020.
It is looking to them to provide the space for wind turbine manufacturers, their supply chain and land/sea logistics operation.
Mr Pellew said that such operations were less profitable for port operators than some other developments - notably major import centres, such as that being built by Tesco at Teesport.
“Wind farms are an opportunity (for ports) but they are very land consuming in terms of both construction and shipping,” he said.
“If you added together all the tonnage for building all the turbines for Round 3 (the bidding process for the largest windfarms) it’s still less than a third of the tonnage we project to put through the new Teesport container terminal.”
He said Teesside, and in particular Hartlepool had “all the right skills” and was “in the right place” to benefit from major expansion in offshore wind, much of which is to be concentrated off the North-east coast.
