Plans for a major offshore windfarm have been given the go ahead following a government grant of �10m.

The development by National Windpower off the north Wales coast will result in 30 wind turbines being built, providing 50MW of electricity for 50,000 homes.

A graphic impression of the north Wales scheme

A second project in Norfolk run by Powergen will receive the same amount of funding from the government's capital grants programme.

UK Energy Minister Brian Wilson, who announced the schemes in July, said the north Wales development, off at North Hoyle off the coast of Rhyl and Prestatyn, would provide up to 140 construction jobs.

It is hoped the development can be completed for operation by the autumn of next year.

Guidelines were also issued to developers about where to locate wind farms to avoid interfering with military and civil air routes.

At July's launch of the project, Mr Wilson said Wales was "blessed with some of the finest energy rich natural resources in the world".

Mr Wilson is keen to see similar developments built to meet the government's targets of providing 10% of the UK's energy resources from renewable sources.

Energy for homes

In March this year, a report by the Welsh Assembly said that the country needed a dramatic increase in the number of windfarms to meet suggested new targets for the generation of renewable energy.

It set out that Wales should aim to produce enough electricity from renewable sources to supply more than three million homes by 2010.

Major windfarm projects in Wales are already the source of controversy.

In December 2001, Brian Wilson gave the go-ahead for the biggest wind farm in the Britain to be built in Ceredigion in west Wales.

Once built, the �35m development at Cefn Croes should supply nearly 50% of the electricity needs of Ceredigion and 1% of the needs of Wales.