Media Isle of Man had the honour of being part of Energy Sustainability Centre's recent 'Roundtable' session, organised by MMC and hosted by Capital International Group.
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00You're potentially one of those exciting renewable projects that the INC will see, essentially.
00:07Can you give us a bit of an update on where you're at and what the next phase of those plans are?
00:12Yes, so we had some fantastic community events back in November last year across the island
00:19seeking feedback on that initial scoping of what we could make the project look like.
00:25The team have been busily designing more detail on those plans and with various stakeholders across the island
00:32meeting with them weekly and bringing together all the feedback on what we think we can do here.
00:37As you say, it's something that we've never seen really before in the island
00:42and that kind of scale of being able to have an offshore wind farm that uses those natural resources
00:47that are out there in the wind and good seabed.
00:51We're looking at doing up to 100 turbines, which would be a project in the region of 1.4 gigawatts.
00:57Obviously, again, on the scale of what the island needs, it's significantly more
01:01but it's all about that economic opportunity and exporting that power and having the revenue
01:07but the jobs and skills and experience very much located on the island.
01:12That's what we're looking to do. We'll take it forward to public consultation this summer.
01:18We'll be out there in July, August and September.
01:21People will see a lot of us. My ambition is that people will be sick of the sight of me by the end of it
01:25in terms of our engagement.
01:27It's open to all stakeholders and all members of the community to give views on all topics.
01:32It's really important for us.
01:35We've done more of this at Orsted than any other developer.
01:39We're the largest in terms of this region, operating offshore wind and developing and constructing it and running it.
01:46Our view is very much you've got to embed yourself in the community wherever you are
01:50and you've got to deliver these things sustainably and do it right for the long term.
01:55As an example of that, we made the commitment on our projects at Orsted post-2030
02:00that all of them will have no negative effect from a biodiversity point of view.
02:05They will be biodiversity net positive and that means Murvanan is in that camp.
02:10It will be operational post-2030.
02:12We're already working with Lee and colleagues at Manx Wildlife Trust and other stakeholders
02:17on some of the projects we can do in the Isle of Man.
02:20I am convinced with the importance that's attached to the biosphere status
02:25and the opportunities and engagement there is with the environment
02:30through organisations like Manx Wildlife Trust and membership in the community,
02:34we can do those kind of things much quicker and actually have a much better long term goal.
02:40Our goal as a company is to leave the places we develop these projects better than we found them
02:46and actually in that space in the Manx territorial waters off the east coast,
02:51there's a real chance to do some innovative things in the Isle of Man waters
02:56that you may not be able to do in other countries around the biodiversity and ecological improvement.
03:01There's a lot of winds and it's sometimes difficult to explain all the winds in one go.
03:08What we acknowledge is that there's going to be an impact visually because of where the project is,
03:13but I know what's happening already in other developments coming in the Irish Sea
03:17and other countries that neighbour the Isle of Man and what they're planning to do in offshore wind as well.
03:22This is happening all around us and the question very much is,
03:26does the Isle of Man want to play its part and take its part?
03:29It will secure energy independence for the island as well if we can secure that link to the island for power,
03:34but it can be a massive transformative project just at its scale.