About us
- The Crown Estate is a diverse property business valued at more than £7 billion. We have been trusted to manage a wide range of properties across the UK including commercial and retail properties. In the country, it includes agricultural land, parkland and forestry. It includes shopping centres, business parks, farms and housing. And we have over half the foreshore and almost all of the seabed around the UK.
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The Crown
Estate

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Urban
- The Crown Estate's urban portfolio comprises a wide and varied mix of properties ranging from modern purpose-built offices, retail and shopping centres to Grade I listed buildings.
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- Retail
  Prime retail is one of our core sectors.
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Marine
- We manage virtually the entire seabed out to the 12 nautical mile territorial limit, as well as around half of the foreshore.
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- Aggregates
  Our estate includes the rights to explore and utilise the mineral interests of the UK continental shelf.
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Energy
- The Crown Estate is a key player in supporting the delivery of a diverse and secure energy supply for the UK.
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- Offshore wind energy
  As managers of the seabed out to the 12 nm limit, we play a major role in the development of the offshore wind energy industry in the UK.
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Rural
- The rural estate comprises the agricultural, mineral and forestry estates in England, Scotland & Wales, as well as residential and commercial property.
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- Agriculture
  Our agricultural interests include both livestock and arable farming over 106,000 hectares (263,000 acres) across the UK.
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Windsor
- The Windsor Estate covers approximately 6,400 hectares and includes Windsor Great Park, the Home Park of Windsor Castle, extensive forests, residential and commercial properties, golf courses, a racecourse and let farms.
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- The Royal Landscape
  Situated in the southeast corner of Windsor Great Park lies The Royal Landscape, featuring the famous Savill and Valley Gardens.
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Our portfolio

The energy portfolio is focused on marine renewable energy, with offshore wind playing a significant role.

Since 2000, we have run five rounds of offshore wind which have increased in scale and technical complexity as the industry has developed. Leases for projects and programmes are associated with all the UK waters - England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Although wave and tidal is an emerging industry, we have already completed the world's first wave and tidal stream programme in the Pentland Firth and Orkney waters. We are also providing leases for demonstration projects around the UK, and are actively planning further leasing and supporting activities for the coming years.

The Crown Estate has been involved in natural gas storage since 1983. Through the 2008 Energy Act, we obtained the rights to lease underground storage space on the UK Continental Shelf, and have since negotiated lease options for two prospective gas storage facilities.

CO₂ transportation and storage is a new activity for us and we are working with all stakeholders, government departments, developers and utility companies to develop detailed implementation arrangements within UK waters.

Another new activity is based around marine biomass, which can be used to heat homes or provide a source of fine chemical or transport fuel. We are focusing on the best way to grow, harvest and process seaweed, and to understand the economic, environmental and social impacts of large-scale seaweed farming in the sea around the UK.

Rounds 1 and 2 wind farms

Rounds 1 and 2 wind farms

We have been at the forefront of the development and expansion of offshore wind energy in the UK for well over a decade. The UK is one of the world's leaders in both installed generation capacity and the development pipeline in excess of 40 gigawatts (GW).

Details of Round 1 and 2 projects

To date we have pursued a series of leasing rounds under which areas of the seabed have been made available for the development of offshore wind farms.

Round 1 started in December 2000 and was the beginning of our leasing of areas of the seabed for commercial development of offshore wind farms in UK waters. Typically the projects had no more than 30 turbines in areas selected by developers, were small in scale, typically 0.1 GW and close to the shore. There are now 12 Round 1 projects fully operational with a generating capacity of just under 1 GW. Two sites are currently under construction with an additional output capacity of 0.2 GW.

Our second round of leasing, Round 2, started in July 2003 for projects in proximity to the Greater Wash, the Thames Estuary and Liverpool Bay, including some outside the 12 nautical mile territorial waters limit. These wind farms are larger in scale and with most further away from the shore than Round 1 projects. There are 17 Round 2 projects with a total generating capacity of some 7.2 GW. Three projects are currently fully operational with a capacity of 0.55 GW and six are under construction with a design capacity of some 2.5 GW.

Extensions

In 2010 we announced the award of development rights to four Round 1 and Round 2 sites to extend their geographical areas. These have a total output capacity of some 1.5 GW. The developers are planning for them to be fully operational delivery by 2016 at the latest.

In total there are some 35 Round 1, Round 2 and extensions projects with a total projected output of just under 10 GW. 15 projects are fully operational with a capacity of 1.5 GW - enough to provide power to over one million homes. A further eight projects are currently under construction with a capacity of 2.7 GW, two of which should complete by the end of 2011.

Round 3 wind farms

Round 3 wind farms

The UK government has a challenging target to deliver 15 per cent of energy from renewable sources by 2020. Much of this energy is expected to come from offshore wind.

Details of Round 3 projects

Through our rights to lease the UK seabed for renewable energy projects we have been involved in offshore wind since 2000. This includes 8 GW of capacity in Round 1 and 2 offshore wind farms which are already in operation, under construction or in development.

The UK Offshore Energy Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA), published in January 2009, identified up to 33 GW of offshore wind capacity in UK waters. This formed the basis of the Round 3 offshore wind programme, which will contribute significantly to meeting the UK's renewable energy target. It will also:

support growth of the UK's offshore renewables industry
contribute to energy security objectives
generate revenue for the benefit of the nation.

Nine offshore wind farm zones of varying sizes were identified within UK waters to deliver the capacity identified in the SEA. Renewable energy developers were asked to bid for exclusive rights to develop offshore wind farms within the zones. The successful development partners for each zone were announced in January 2010.

The development partners are now undertaking environmental and engineering studies as well as liaising closely with stakeholders to define individual projects within the zones. The first offshore wind farm projects are expected to be submitted to the Infrastructure Planning Commission (IPC) for consent in 2012. Construction of the first Round 3 projects is expected to start in the middle of this decade.