Octopus Energy Generation has revealed plans to repower up to 1,000 existing onshore wind turbines in the UK in partnership with turbine manufacturer EWT.
The firm said this could include fitting larger blades or completely replacing the turbines with newer and more powerful versions. It said the repowered turbines would range in capacity from 250kW to 1MW.
Octopus said the old turbines it has identified are owned by a range of private individuals, including landowners and farmers. It said the repowering programme emerged from its Plots for Kilowatts campaign, which invited landowners to register plots where the company could explore building new wind turbines. As part of this, Octopus saw interest from landowners who already host wind turbines in replacing or enlarging them.
Zoisa North-Bond, chief executive of Octopus Energy Generation, comments: “We need to build enormous amounts of new renewable power, but at the same time it’s a no-brainer to make better use of the UK’s existing onshore wind turbines.
“There’s a huge untapped opportunity to repower wind turbines that communities have already hosted for many years. This means powering even more homes with cheaper, local, green energy, helping to drive down energy bills and provide energy security.”
Octopus has already worked with EWT on its two Fan Club turbines at Caerphilly in Wales and Market Weighton in Yorkshire. Under the Fan Club model, customers living within 5kms of the turbines can sign up to a special tariff that enables them to receive a 20% discount on their electricity whenever they are spinning and a 50% discount when the wind picks and output is high.
The repowered turbines will be managed and operated by Octopus Energy on behalf of either the turbine owners or new institutional investors. It is exploring whether some of these turbines could be brought onto a Fan Club-style model.
Octopus and EWT are also looking to work together to replicate the repowering programme in other European countries in the future.
EWT chief executive Carel Kok said: “By working with Octopus to rapidly repower lots of older turbines in the UK, we’ll help bring online much more renewable capacity.
“Our powerful and tech-enabled turbines are the perfect ‘goldilocks’ solution for communities. We’re looking forward to installing many more in the years to come to turn this vision into reality.”