The UK has reached a historic milestone of 30GW of wind generation capacity with the opening of the Viking Wind Farm on the Shetland Islands.

Viking Wind Farm, developed by SSE Renewables, has been in development for more than 15 years, at a cost of approximately £1.2bn in private investment.

According to SSE, because of windy conditions in Shetland, which lies 110 miles north-east of mainland Scotland, it will be the “most productive” onshore wind farm in the UK, generating around 1.8TWh of renewable electricity annually – enough to power almost half a million typical British homes.

With all 103 Vestas turbines installed, together with a 260km high voltage direct current (HVDC) subsea cable, green electricity will now be delivered from Shetland to the UK grid.

“Delivery of both the Viking Wind Farm and Shetland HVDC transmission link are big engineering achievements and together represent a major milestone on the UK’s path to a clean energy system,” said Alistair Phillips-Davies, SSE chief...