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Wind energy to almost half a million households

49 windmills bring Denmark closer to climate goals.

It is very windy in the North Sea, and that wind is now running 49 giant windmills approximately 20 km off the western coast of Denmark at the Horns Rev 3 windmill park. In order to produce that amount of electricity the windmills have to be big. Very big. From top to bottom the windmills are 187 meters tall, that is more or less like two times Big Ben. Out there in the windy North Sea the wind is now being harvested and is powering refrigerators heating, washing machines and mobile phones in 425.000 homes. The windmill park was inaugurated August 22nd thereby increasing Danish electricity generation from wind by around 12 per cent. The windmill park covers an area of 88 km2.

The first foundation for Horns Rev 3 was embedded in the seabed in October 2017 and the installation of the turbines themselves began in summer 2018. The first turbines began supplying Danish consumers with electricity on 23 December of the same year. The last turbine was installed in January 2019, and the turbines have been gradually started up until the present.

The establishment of Horns Rev 3 was decided by the Danish Parliament in 2012 and plays an important role in realising the ambition of supplying half of all Danish electricity via wind power by 2020.

Each wing has a wingspan of 80 meters. In comparison it is as long as the wing of an Airbus A380.

A single blade rotation will produce enough energy to recharge 1317 smartphones, drive 87 km in an electric car, or watch TV for 95 hours.

What was recently thought to be utopian is now becoming a reality. Fossil free energy is on its way to become the primary source of energy in Denmark. In 2009 only 20 percent of the energy came from wind energy, but in 2018 over 40 percent came from wind. One of the great challenges is to have a stable supply of fossil free energy. Some days there is no wind, and the windmills will produce no electricity, and at night solar panels will not produce any electricity. In 2018 41 days and nights all electricity came from fossil free sources and minor power plants. There was no need for retracting electricity from coal in the coal burning power plants. Only a few years ago it was considered a huge victory if electricity could rely on renewable sources just one day. Slowly but steadily this grew to a whole week, and now almost a month and a half.

The windmill park Horns Rev 3 is designed to run for 25 years. Another huge windmill park, Kriegers Flak is being built in the Baltic Sea. After the seabed has been cleared from old grenades, relics and mines 77 huge windmills will be put up. Kriegers Flak is planned to be concluded in 2021.

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