Celtic Sea Floating Offshore Wind Leasing Round 5 - Project Development Area 2 - Direct Award

CPV: Construction-related services · Electricity · Electricity supply installations · Offshore mooring work · Offshore-module fabrication work · Subsea drilling work · Turbine works · Wind farm · Wind turbines · Wind-power installation works · Works for complete or part construction and civil engineering work

Procedure method

Award procedure without prior publication of a call for competition

Legal basis

CELEX · 32014L0023 Concession Contracts Regulations 2016 (Directive 2014/23/EU)

Procurement category

Services

Notice status

Awarded without competition

Procurement threshold

Unspecified in notice

Regulatory regime

Standard

Commercial structure

Stand-alone contract (no framework)

Competition type

Direct award (no call for competition)

GPA / WTO covered

Unspecified in notice

Recurring procurement

Unspecified in notice

First published

19 Nov 2025, 18:28 GMT

Last source update

19 Nov 2025, 18:28 GMT

FTS notice number

2025/S 000-075437

Classification (CPV)

Construction-related servicesElectricityElectricity supply installationsOffshore mooring workOffshore-module fabrication workSubsea drilling workTurbine worksWind farmWind turbinesWind-power installation works

+1 more

Works for complete or part construction and civil engineering work

Delivery area

UK

Official registry OCID

ocds-h6vhtk-05e4de Find a Tender

Why no open competition

No applications, no tenders or no suitable tenders/applications in response to a prior concession award procedure

Published justification

Important note: The contract which is the subject of this notice is being awarded by The Crown Estate by way of switching to a direct award following an unsuccessful tendering procedure, as explained further below.

Please note that a transparency notice has also been published in respect of this direct award (notice identifier: 2025/S 000-075016; procurement identifier: ocds-h6vhtk-05e3e2). For the avoidance of doubt, the two notices relate to the same (i.e. single) direct award., which is being run in accordance with the PA 2023.

The contract is to be awarded directly to a supplier that is not an excluded supplier by virtue of section 43 of the Procurement Act 2023 ("PA 2023").

The Crown Estate held a competitive tender process for the granting of new seabed rights to developers for the development of new floating offshore wind farms within three PDAs, which was advertised by way of a concession notice published on Find a Tender on 28 February 2024 (notice identifier: 2024/S 000-006434) (Celtic Sea Floating Offshore Wind Leasing Round 5 ("Round 5")). The Round 5 tender process was designed to result in the award of three separate agreements for lease to three different successful suppliers - one for each of the three PDAs. Two bidders remained at the final (auction) stage of the process and bid successfully for two of the PDAs. Under the rules of the Round 5 tender process no bidder could be awarded rights in respect of more than one PDA and no tender was received for the third PDA. The Crown Estate considers that for the purposes of section 43(2) of the PA 2023 no tenders were received for the agreement for lease for the third PDA.

The Crown Estate considers that an award of the contract under section 19 of the PA 2023 is not possible in the circumstances. A delay to granting rights in respect of the third PDA while a further full competitive tender process is designed and run risks a number of potentially significant adverse effects on all three PDAs. Timely deployment of all three PDAs is needed to provide the certainty the supply chain, ports and other critical infrastructure need to plan and invest in floating wind in the UK. Without the full award of three PDAs, it is possible that the necessary investment in supply chain and ports may not be forthcoming (or may be delayed) resulting in possible delay to delivery. Any delays to the award of the third PDA could also delay skills development and the necessary investment in people required to support Round 5, causing delays in deployment of the programme. In addition, the experience and outcome of the Round 5 tender provide compelling evidence that the current challenging market conditions are such that a further, lengthy full tender process is unlikely to deliver a successful outcome for the third PDA.

Publisher note: Please note that the contract for PDA2 has not already been entered into between The Crown Estate and the successful supplier. The “date of conclusion of the contract” in section V.2.1 above has been entered purely for the purpose of enabling publication of this notice. The estimated date of entry into the agreement for lease is 20 February 2026, and the agreement for lease’s estimated end date is 19 February 2036.

• Ocean Winds UK LimitedAwarded supplier07101190 Shepherd And Wedderburn Llp, London, UK, EC3V 9AAContact emailShow contact details

No document links were published on the notice.