Members of the newly-formed World Forum Offshore Wind (WFO) association have signed a ”500 by 50” Mission Statement to pave the way to utilising the industry’s potential to build additional 500GW of offshore wind capacity by the year 2050.
This mission is based on the latest projection by the International Renewable Energy Agency’s (IRENA) transformation roadmap which states that the industry has the potential to reach 520GW of installed offshore wind capacity by the year 2050.
Since 22GW is already installed, this leaves almost 500GW of offshore wind capacity which needs to be developed, built and installed over the next three decades until 2050, WFO said.
WFO and its members are convinced that this steep offshore wind growth can only be achieved if the global offshore wind community across the whole value chain works together with governments and regulators around the world. In a collaborative, cross-industry and multilateral approach a clear growth path for offshore wind in markets around the world needs to be implemented.
The non-profit association has also published its updated global offshore wind figures which show that 4,988MW of offshore wind capacity was added globally in 2018, making it a record year in terms of the annual added capacity.
WFO was launched in December 2018 by DEME NV, EEW Special Pipe Constructions GmbH, E.ON Climate & Renewables GmbH, Green Giraffe BV, innogy SE, Marsh GmbH, Northland Power Inc, Suzlon Energy Limited, US Business Network for Offshore Wind, and Watson Farley & Williams LLP.