Milestone for wind farm plans off Lincolnshire coast bringing £2bn investment and jobs

The Planning Inspectorate has accepted the Development Consent Order (DCO) application submitted by Outer Dowsing Offshore Wind for a 1.5 GW wind farm after three years of work to get to this stage.

It is proposed that the wind farm will be sited 33 miles off the Lincolnshire coast. However, Lincolnshire World has been told it is unlikely the turbines will be visible from the shore. Only the upper parts of a small number of the wind turbines could potentially be visible from the shore on a few days of the year.

In addition, due to there being existing projects in between Outer Dowsing Offshore Wind and the shore, the Outer Dowsing Offshore wind turbines will be masked by the other wind farms making it difficult to see them from most locations along the coast.

Outer Dowsing Offshore Wind is being developed by TotalEnergies, Corio Generation and Gulf Energy Development. The DCO application includes an offshore wind farm comprising up to 100 turbines, underground cables to carry the power from the landfall site close to Anderby Marsh and a new onshore substation at Surfleet Marsh. The project will then connect into existing National Grid overhead transmission lines in the Weston Marsh area.

Following multiple rounds of consultation, Outer Dowsing has integrated many changes to their initial design such as using horizontal directional drilling to drill underneath sensitive areas, onshore cable route amendments and offshore boundary changes to mitigate navigation impacts.

Outer Dowsing Offshore Wind will reduce emissions equivalent to nearly two million tonnes of CO2 per year of operations through the generation of renewable electricity. This is equivalent to removing over 650,000 petrol cars from the road for the duration of the Project.

Upon hearing the news, Chris Jenner, Outer Dowsing Development Director said: “This milestone marks the culmination of three years of work and it is thanks to the experience on the team and highly engaged communities that we were able to get the project to this stage in this time frame.

“Through our voluntary participation in the Early Adopters Programme we were also able to streamline certain processes to help refine the substation design principles. We are now one step closer to building a 1.5 GW wind farm that over its lifetime could result in an injection of over £2 billion of UK investment alongside the creation of hundreds of local jobs. We look forward to offering full cooperation with The Planning Inspectorate throughout the upcoming examination period.”

The project will now move to the examination stage where a panel of independent inspectors will conduct the examination of the application and make a recommendation to the Secretary of State about whether the project should go ahead. Outer Dowsing Offshore Wind will now take steps to formally notify consultees and landowners of the acceptance of the submission and how they will be able to make representations on the Application.

As part of this process, anyone can have their say about the project. All interested parties who wish to take part in the process should register for updates directly on the Planning Inspectorate web page for Outer Dowsing Offshore Wind:

To have your say visit here: Outer Dowsing Offshore Wind (Generating Station) - Project Information (planninginspectorate.gov.uk)