UK Getting Deepwater Offshore Wind Test Site

The European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC) in Scotland is working on setting up a deepwater and floating wind test facility off Orkney.

After securing a 50 per cent match funding through The Crown Estate’s Supply Chain Accelerator, the organisation has commenced an 18‑month project to move the development of the test facility, named DeepWind, from concept to delivery.

EMEC says that it has identified a site 20 kilometres west of Orkney with ideal water depths, seabed conditions and wind speeds for the project, which will build on EMEC’s earlier concept design for a national floating wind test site.

The GBP 500,000 (around EUR 576,200) project will complete feasibility, design scoping and industry engagement to confirm site infrastructure requirements, considering logistical and operational needs to ensure connectivity to ports and alignment with the UK offshore wind ecosystem.

EMEC will also progress environmental scoping and early-stage survey work at the prospective site, including bathymetry, sub‑bottom profiling and ornithological/marine mammal monitoring.

“The Crown Estate’s Accelerator funding enables us to move decisively from concept to delivery planning for our deepwater wind test site. During the project, we aim to progress leasing and grid-connection applications, and will initiate some of the longest-lead environmental studies, moving us towards full consenting and Front-End Engineering Design”, said Mark Hamilton, Operations & Technology Director at EMEC.

“The key outcome will be a robust investment case for phased development of the test site. We will be running a series of engagement exercises over the coming months to gather insight from developers, OEMs, insurers, investors, regulators and community groups and I encourage interested parties to get in touch with us for more detail on how they can help shape the future of UK offshore wind testing.”

EMEC said that it is developing the DeepWind test site as UK offshore wind projects are moving into deeper waters and developers require a representative environment to try out the technologies before full commercial deployment, but that existing test sites across Europe lack the necessary metocean conditions for the offshore wind projects in the UK’s pipeline.

The UK government is also looking into deepwater technologies from the perspective of the Contracts for Difference (CfD) scheme. In December 2025, the government launched a consultation on proposed refinements to the CfD scheme ahead of Allocation Round 8 (AR8) and future rounds, with one of the refinements being the introduction of a new CfD technology category: Other Deepwater Offshore Wind (ODOW). 

With the ODOW category, the government wants to make room for the novel hybrid foundation designs, “which may be suitable for deepwater deployment but do not technically float and would therefore not be considered eligible as ‘floating foundations’ under the existing legal definition of ‘floating offshore wind’.”

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