Siemens’ green light for Green Port Hull

The revised plan will be spread across two sites comprising the previously announced Green Port Hull project construction, assembly and service facility and a new rotor blade manufacturing facility in nearby Paull, in East Riding.

Siemens is investing £160m across the two locations and its port partner Associated British Ports (ABP) is investing a further £150m in the Green Port Hull development. The investment will provide a huge boost to the UK’s offshore wind industry and the Humber region. The combined investments of £310m will create up to 1,000 jobs directly, with additional jobs during construction and indirectly in the supply chain.

“Our decision to construct a production facility for offshore wind turbines in England is part of our global strategy, said Michael Suess, member of the managing board of Siemens AG and CEO of the Energy Sector.

“The offshore wind market in Great Britain has high growth rates, with an even greater potential for the future. Wind power capacity has doubled here within two years, to roughly 10GW. By 2020, a capacity of 14GW is to be installed at sea alone to combine the country’s environmental objectives with secure power supply. Projects for just over 40GW are currently in the long-term planning.”

The Green Port Hull project has been in the making for around four years and is the product of a huge team effort between many national and local political, business and community parties and many people within Siemens in the UK, Denmark and Germany, and ABP.

It’s also a landmark moment for the Humber region, promising regeneration and the creation of many hundreds of new jobs and new skills. Siemens manufacturing plans will help create around 1,000 jobs – 550 at the blade factory and 450 at Green Port Hull.

Siemens and ABP will be submitting planning applications to Hull City Council and East Riding Council over the next few months for revisions to the existing proposed scheme at Alexandra Dock and for land in Paull in East Riding for the wind turbine blade factory.

Green Port Hull is planned to be operational to meet Round 3 requirements in early 2016. The start of production at the blade factory is scheduled to be in the middle of 2016 with full production levels reached from mid 2017 onwards.