Evaluating the essential barrier to off-shore wind energy: an Indian perspective

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the essential barrier and reveal the priority among common barriers to offshore wind energy in an Indian context with the assistance of the proposed framework. Design/methodology/approach: Based on the proposed framework, a five-phase methodology was adapted to explore the essential barrier step by step. The common barriers, which were collected from the existing literatures through a systematic review, were further validated by field experts. The collected common barriers were evaluated with the assistance of the case industry’s field professionals through an analytical hierarchy process, a multi-criteria decision-making tool, to evaluate the barriers to Indian offshore wind energy. Findings: Among the 12 common barriers to offshore wind energy, it is clear that “high capital cost” is the most essential barrier involved in the implementation of offshore wind energy farms in the Indian context. Practical implications: This study reveals the importance of offshore wind power as a long-term profitable strategy to the case company within the Indian context. By addressing the essential barriers to the implementation of offshore wind farms, the Indian offshore wind system managers can train their employees to counteract the hindrances through the benchmarking of pioneering global offshore wind power developers such as Denmark and the UK. Further, this study provides useful suggestions to the Indian Government regarding policies for offshore wind energy; it also clearly projects the current status of the Indian offshore wind farm implementation. Originality/value: This study assists Indian key stakeholders of offshore wind energy by indicating the essential barrier in an Indian context; they can remove the particular barrier instead of focusing on others that previous studies have identified. Further, this study brings out the importance of offshore wind power in an Indian context, which can urge stakeholders to invest more in offshore wind farms.