Published on 2 Mar 2015

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon joined Iberdrola and ScottishPower Chairman Ignacio Galan to officially open a new £1million operations centre at Whitelee Windfarm, which monitors over 900 wind turbines that powered over 740,000 homes last year.

The state-of-the-art facility can remotely oversee all of ScottishPower Renewables’ windfarm developments, currently 31 operational sites. Operators continuously monitor the 929 turbines, using sophisticated weather software to plan the operations and maintenance and speak to National Grid. In 2014 ScottishPower Renewables’ had a record year for wind power, generating over 3100 GWh – meeting the annual electricity demands of more than 742,000 homes.

In total the company has 1,600 MW of wind power in operation and approximately 500 MW consented or under construction. Since ScottishPower’s merger with Iberdrola in 2007, there has been an average annual investment of £300 million in renewable energy. Just last week the company announced that it was taking forward the £2 billion 714MW East Anglia ONE offshore windfarm.