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Manufacturing Minute: The Worldโ€™s Largest Floating Wind Farm

In this episode, Scotland will soon host the worldโ€™s largest floating wind farm.

In this episode, Scotland will soon host the worldโ€™s largest floating wind farm. This is your Manufacturing Minute.

Last week, the Scottish government approved a proposal by Statoil to build five turbines about 18 miles off its coast. The turbines will have a capacity of 30 megawatts of power, which is enough to supply about 20,000 homes and make it the first utility-scale installation of its kind.

Rather than being directly anchored to the sea floor, the turbines are connected to each other with cables and anchored with a three-point spread mooring system.

The floating structures will expand the range of wind turbines to waters up to 120 meters deep. Fixed turbines max out at around 50 meters of water.

Construction is expected to begin in late 2017.

So, What Do You Think?

Do you think these structures can stand up to the elements? Could offshore wind be a new source of low-carbon energy for the U.K.?

Email us or leave your comments below.

Thatโ€™s all the time we have for today, but tune in every weekday for your next Manufacturing Minute. 

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