SSE Renewables backs green energy NOW and for the future

As the UK continues to drive innovation and development within the renewable energy field, it is exciting to watch projects progress through the design and development stages. In recent news, SSE Renewables has committed substantial funding to facilitate growth of offshore wind infrastructure at the Port of Nigg facility near Inverness in Scotland with £15m debt investment. SSE’s substantial, multi-million-pound investment in NOW-Nigg Offshore Wind, a new £110m offshore wind turbine tower factory in the Scottish Highlands that will produce the next generation of offshore wind farms to power Scotland and the world – will help create hundreds of full-time direct and thousands of indirect green jobs. This will be the most significant localisation of offshore wind supply chain manufacturing ever built in Scotland and the UK.

What’s the project?

Global Energy Group (GEG) and Haizea Wind Group are building what will be the UK’s largest offshore wind tower manufacturing facility at the Port of Nigg. It will be an impressive 450-meter-long, 38,000m2 factory that can fabricate towers of over 1,000 tonnes. Nigg Offshore Wind (NOW) will provide significant support to the offshore fixed and floating wind industries across the UK, boasting the capabilities and resources to build as many as 135 towers annually and other important structures like transitions pieces, suction buckets and bespoke tubular solutions. It will prove hugely advantageous to the many projects being designed and already under development in Scotland by localising a substantial aspect of the offshore wind manufacturing supply chain.

The project is being supported by an array of organisations aside from SSE Renewables, with the funding syndicate including Sequoia Infrastructure Debt Fund and Mainstream Renewable Power. The Scottish Government also provided funding through the Highlands and Islands Enterprise, as did the UK Government through the offshore wind manufacturing investment support scheme. Construction has been scheduled to start January 2022, with site preparation, building and commissioning anticipated for the following 18 months.

Putting money where its mouth is

SSE Renewables has made this state-of-the-art project possible by committing to a debt investment of £15 million, making it the largest single UK backer behind the plans. In addition to driving the sector forwards as a whole, this will put SSE Renewables in an unrivalled position within the sector to optimise UK supply chain opportunities for the future. The organisation is involved in the building of more offshore wind projects than any other company around the world and this new facility in Scotland will facilitate several local site developments.

CEO of SSE, Alistair Phillips-Davies, commented:

"This announcement shows that SSE is willing to put its money where its mouth is to support development of the Scottish manufacturing capability for the offshore wind sector. We have worked with Global Energy Group and stakeholders for over two years to get to this point. Global Energy Group has exciting plans for a world-class tower factory at Port of Nigg and our investment in the planned manufacturing facility demonstrates our continuing commitment to do what we can to support the development of a competitive Scottish supply chain and create local jobs.

“In addition to the debt funding, SSE also looks forward to fulfilling its role as a strategic backer and placing orders with the factory to meet our growing offshore wind pipeline in the near future. SSE is in a unique position with projects of scale, such as Dogger Bank and Berwick Bank, to create sustainable, long-term supply chain opportunities such as at Nigg and the new GE blade factory in Teesside."

SSE is already a major contributor to the Dogger Bank 3.6GW site – in association with Equinor and Eni – as well as the 1.1GW Seagreen projects with TotalEnergies, both due for delivery in the coming years. Then there is the ground-breaking Berwick Bank project in the pipeline that is expected to deliver up to 4.1GW, plus looking even further ahead any new tenders won as part of the ScotWind seabed leasing Round 4, anticipated for Spring 2022.SSE Renewables is part of a leading consortium with Marubeni Corporation and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, who are bidding in the ScotWind leasing process to help secure 10GW of new offshore wind projects off the Scottish coast.

Industry and nationwide economy

The announcement of SSE Renewables’ investment in the future of offshore wind brings good news for both the industry and the wider UK economy. The green energy sector has already been heralded for its potential to boost the financial landscape while also increasing the UK’s sustainability credentials. Once functional, NOW alone will directly create an estimated 400 new full-time manufacturing jobs, with a further 1,800 jobs made available indirectly too. This will not only provide exciting employment opportunities for the local communities, but also enable the existing workforce to make use of their extensive skills and experience across the sector. Individuals will be able to retrain and transfer proficiencies learnt in other industries such as oil and gas in order to support the development of renewable energy. At a time when it is so important to generate employment prospects and income for the nation, this project offers much-needed opportunities to allow and sustain economic growth.

Setting an example

The Nigg Offshore Wind project will do much to streamline the offshore wind supply chain in Scotland and for the whole of the UK. Its close physical proximity to existing and developing offshore wind farms will not only help to simplify logistics, but could also offer various cost-efficiencies for local projects.

RenewableUK’s Deputy Chief Executive Melanie Onn added:

“It is hugely exciting to see projects such as Nigg Offshore Wind progress with the support of a major UK company like SSE Renewables. It is a milestone for Scotland and for the UK as a whole as we look to accelerate growth of the green energy market so that we can reach net-zero as fast as possible. SSE’s investment in this project is just one example of the several landmark announcements made across the industry this year, in which we saw an annual record amount of over £1billion invested in new UK offshore wind manufacturing facilities throughout the country, creating thousands of high-quality jobs in clean technology. It is this kind of commitment, innovation and forward-thinking that keeps the UK to the forefront of developments in the global renewable energy sector.”

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