Teesside wins 140 energy jobs

Mayflower Energy makes turbines for offshore use

More than 140 new jobs will be created when one of the country's largest energy companies relocates to the Tees Valley.

Mayflower Energy, which has former Prime Minister John Major as a non-executive director, will construct state-of-the-art wind turbines.

The firm specialises in offshore wind farms and will use a derelict riverside site to start production.

The company is promising hundreds more jobs for Teesside.

Huge turbines

Head of the Tees Valley Development Company Neil Ethrington, said the Tees Valley is "perfect" for the company.

He said: "We have river frontage ready to be developed and the skills here.

"Mayflower have teamed up with a local firm which developed a technique for lifting huge wind turbines and placing them into the seabed.

"Mayflower are a pretty big plc and they are taking this new industry very seriously.

"The Tees Valley is increasingly becoming a major player, and this is likely to attract other companies and industries to the area."

Earlier this year plans were unveiled for the world's biggest brown field wind farm to be built on Teesside.

Northumberland-based Amec Wind and Corus is to build 18 giant turbines on the site of a former British Steel works, to generate power for 30,000 homes by 2004.