Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what the offshore wind capital expenditure data was for each of the last two years; and what the evidential basis is for his Department's assessment of the fall in the cost of wind power.

The Department does not hold data on capital expenditure for individual offshore wind projects. The Department’s latest projection of capital expenditure for generic offshore wind projects is published in Arup (2016): Review of Renewable Electricity Generation Cost and Technical Assumptions, and can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/arup-2016-review-of-renewable-electricity-generation-cost-and-technical-assumptions.

The Contracts for Difference (CfD) Second Allocation Round results, which were announced on 11 September 2017, showed one offshore wind project commissioning in 2021/22 cleared at a strike price of £74.75/MWh (2012 prices) and two offshore wind projects commissioning in year 2022/23 cleared at a strike price of £57.50/MWh (2012 prices). Both these prices represent a saving on the administrative strike price set using the data from Arup (2016), indicating that offshore wind costs are falling.