Statoil has made the final investment decision to build the world’s first floating wind farm: The Hywind pilot park offshore Peterhead in Aberdeenshire, Scotland.

The decision triggers investments of around NOK2bn ($235m).

Statoil will install a 30 MW wind turbine farm on floating structures at Buchan Deep, 25 km offshore Peterhead, to provide renewable energy to the Scottish mainland. The wind farm will power around 20,000 households. Production start is expected in late 2017.

“Statoil is proud to develop the world’s first floating wind farm. Our objective with the Hywind pilot park is to demonstrate the feasibility of future commercial, utility-scale floating wind farms. This will further increase the global market potential for offshore wind energy, contributing to realising our ambition of profitable growth in renewable energy and other low-carbon solutions,” said Irene Rummelhoff, Statoil’s executive vice president for new energy solutions.

The pilot park will cover around 4 sq km, at a water depth of 95-120 m. The average wind speed in this area of the North Sea is around 10 m per second.