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The London Array benefited from stormy weather to turn out 1.5TWh in its first full winter of generation, the company has revealed.
The 630MW offshore windfarm produced enough to power 325,000 households for a year in the six months from October 2013 to March 2014.
Christmas storms, which wreaked havoc with electricity networks, created “near-perfect conditions” for wind power, the operator said.
Windy conditions in December and January, coupled with high availability of the turbines, led to “very high” load factors. Some 15GWh was produced on 6 January alone.
Mike O’Hare, general manager at the London Array, said: “This excellent performance is a testament to the quality of installed components, the well managed construction project, the smooth handover to operations, the support we’ve had from local stakeholders and our service providers who work to keep the turbines turning.”
Prime minister David Cameron sang the praises of the London Array at the official launch last July.
However, a planned second phase of up to 370MW was scrapped in February due to concerns over birdlife.
To go ahead, the company, owned by Eon, Dong, Masdar and Canadian pension fund La Caisse, would have had to carry out a three-year study into the habitat of the red-throated diver. There was “no guarantee” that would be enough to satisfy the authorities, O’Hare said at the time.
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