Northern Ireland’s coastline is not suitable for fixed offshore wind farm development, according to a report by the Department of Economy.
The report writes that as 99% of Northern Ireland’s potential offshore wind sites are located within 13km off the coast the visual impact would represent a significant challenge.
Other potential issues include the Ministry of Defence activity, as well as high-density shipping activity with a traffic of more than a thousand ships per year.
“The modeling found that there were significant challenges which, even with mitigation, mean that the conditions are not yet right for fixed foundation offshore wind development around NI’s coastline,” the report states.
However, the Department of Economy emphasized that this does not mean that in the future offshore wind cannot be developed in Northern Irish waters, especially with the advancement of floating offshore wind.
The assessment resulted in Northern Ireland being excluded from The Crown Estate’s Offshore Wind Leasing Round 4 , which is scheduled to be launched this year after the summer .
The leasing round will make at least 7GW of new seabed rights available to the market,