Hong Kong-based floating wind-power generation pioneer Ocean Wind International Industrial Limited says recent news confirming that half of the total offshore wind-power capacity installed last year deployed by China is “highly encouraging and portends well for the Asia Pacific region as a whole.”
The world’s second-biggest economy installed 3.06 GW in 2020, representing half of the 6 GW deployed globally despite a global economy ravaged by the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. Though much of China’s installed generation used fixed foundations embedded in the seabed, Ocean Wind International believes that future installations will use more floating wind turbines that can be further out to sea and, thus, take advantage of stronger winds while costing less to install and maintain.
“China has a very ambitious goal of reaching carbon neutrality by 2060, but we believe that by making greater use of floating wind turbine solutions that deadline could be brought forward dramatically,” said Jeremy Fitzroy, Ocean Wind International’s chairman and CEO.
The jump in China’s offshore wind-power generation capacity — 9.89 GW — brings it to within a whisker of that being achieved by the world’s biggest offshore wind market, the United Kingdom’s 10.2 GW. Policy advancements being made in other Asian countries are seen as being particularly bullish by Ocean Wind International, especially those in Japan, given the understandable reluctance to revisit nuclear power generation after the devastating Fukushima power plant disaster of 2011.
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