France's €10bn offshore wind plan sets sail

The French government is set to announce plans for a €10bn (£8.2bn) offshore wind farm building programme that will see 600 wind turbines erected at 10 sites off the coast of France over the next five years.

An unnamed official told reporters yesterday that ministers were putting the finishing touches to the plan and would launch a tender for contracts to build and operate the wind farms next month.

He said the project was expected to provide 3,000MW of new wind energy capacity at a cost of about €3.5m per megawatt, adding "that represents an investment programme of €10bn".

The project is expected to act as a precursor to a second round of offshore wind farms after the government signalled earlier this year that it hopes to deliver 6,000MW of offshore wind capacity by 2020.

The tendering process is likely to be welcomed by French energy giant GDF Suez, which is already working on plans for France's first offshore wind farm, the 705MW Compagnie du Vent development nine miles offshore of Le Treport in the north of the country.

The government official signalled that other sites being considered for development as part of the tendering process are off the coasts of Normandy, Britanny and Languedoc-Roussillon in the Mediterranean.

The move provides the latest evidence of a shift in France's energy strategy, which has seen the government step up support for the renewable energy sector in recent months.

France has traditionally relied mainly on nuclear power and as a result has one of the most low-carbon energy mixes in the industrialised world. However, earlier this month the government launched a €1.35bn investment programme designed to accelerate the development of emerging renewable technologies such as marine power and geothermal energy, while plans are also under way to boost the country's solar energy capacity.