Successful bids for nine new offshore wind farm zone licences within UK waters have been announced.
A consortium including Npower and Norway's Statkraft won the licence for the biggest zone, in Dogger Bank, which could produce nine gigawatts of energy.
Turbines in the nine zones could generate up to 32 gigawatts of power, a quarter of the UK's electricity needs.
The winners have signed exclusive agreements with the Crown Estate, which owns the UK seabed.
'Delighted'
Proposals for the wind farms will now go through planning and consent stages.
It will create one of the biggest infrastructure projects for wind energy in the world, with construction beginning in 2014 at the earliest.
The second largest zone, with a potential yield of 7.2 gigawatts, is at Norfolk Bank. The wind farm licence there has been won by a consortium of Scottish Power Renewables and Sweden's Vattenfall Vindkraft.
Speaking on behalf of the joint venture, Keith Anderson said the companies were "delighted" to have been awarded the development rights.
"It will be a major engineering challenge, but the combined experience of both partners acquired over decades in the energy business will help us deliver a project that will deliver enough green power to meet the equivalent annual electricity demand of more than five million homes in the UK," he said.
source/full story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8448203.stm
