Guangdong to build China’s 800 MW offshore wind power plant

The offshore wind farm will involve investments of around 20 billion yuan, have an installed capacity of 1.25 million kilowatts and cover a sea area of 240 square kilometers. After its completion, it will become China’s largest offshore wind farm and demonstration base.

Located along the coastal area of Shanwei city, eastern Guangdong, Lufeng offshore wind farm is subtropical marine monsoon climate. The steady wind speed and direction here can produce good wind resources.

Usage of offshore wind power is very popular in European countries. The wind energy industry in China also saw rapid increase in recent years. By the end of 2009, the wind power installed capacity reached 25,8 GW, ranked second in the world.

Wind power has “tremendous” market potential, and it’s in line with Yunnan’s move into clean-energy projects, Miao Zhimin, deputy director of the provincial industry and information technology commission, said in the statement.

China is planning to launch its biggest offshore wind farm yet in the southwest of the country. The wind farm will be built in the coastal waters outside Shanwei City, Guangdong province. 

China (excluding Taiwan) was the world’s largest market in 2009, more than doubling its capacity from 12.2 GW in 2008 to 25.8 GW, adding a staggering 13.8 GW of capacity, and just slipping past Germany to become the world’s number 2 in total installed capacity.

In April 2009, the National Energy Administration (NEA) asked each coastal province to compile a provincial offshore wind development plan, and divided China’s potential offshore wind sites into three categories, depending on the depth of water: an ‘inter-tidal’ zone for water depth of less than 5 m; an ‘offshore’ zone for water depth of 5-50 m; and a ‘deep sea’ zone deeper than 50 m.

The provincial governments are required to draft offshore development plans for ‘inter-tidal’ and ‘offshore’ wind development up to 2020. Although offshore wind energy development is still in its infancy in China, the first projects already started construction in 2009.

The Shanghai Donghai Daqiao project will have a total capacity of 102 MW, consisting of 34x3MW offshore wind turbines manufactured by the Chinese market leader Sinovel. By the end of 2009, 20 wind turbines had already been installed, three of them connected to the power grid.

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