Developer Vattenfall said the UK is sending “the wrong signal” to the offshore wind sector as it slammed a five-month delay to the planning consent process for a 1.8GW North Sea wind farm.

The examination period for the Swedish utility group’s Norfolk Boreas project was extended to 12 October by the UK’s Planning Inspectorate, which cited disruption to the process caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Vattenfall UK said although it accepted the pandemic would cause some delay, “adding up to five months to the timetable is regrettable”.

Norfolk Boreas project manager Graham Davey said: “In our view, all of the substantive issues in the process have already been resolved. Yet, we're now in a position where potentially the final consent decision may not be known until April next year.

“Delays on this scale influence plans and investment decisions, send the wrong signal to the offshore wind sector as a whole, and call into question Britain's commitment to acting quickly to reduce emissions.”

Norfolk Boreas is one of two huge wind farms Vattenfall is advancing off eastern England. Its twin project, Norfolk Vanguard, is ahead of it in the planning process and due to receive a final consent decision on 1 June.

As well as adding significant new capacity to the UK’s world-leading offshore wind fleet, the two projects are due to pioneer the use of high-voltage direct current (HVDC) 66kV export lines.

The UK is relying on offshore wind to underpin its ambitious net-zero plans for 2050, with industry experts reckoning 75GW will be needed by mid-century, up from 8.5GW now.

But the industry has suffered several planning knock-backs in the North Sea over the last year, among them Orsted’s scheme to double the size of its 573MW Race Bank project which was blocked over environmental concerns.

UK government official admitted earlier in 2020 that Britain may have to look to a faster floating wind build-out off its western shores as east coast developments hit more planning and environmental obstacles.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) said yesterday that Covid-19 disruptions were set to cause the first slowdown in 20 years to new renewable capacity growth in 2020.

Wind

Vattenfall slams UK over consenting delay for giant offshore wind farm