Abstract
This paper is the written version of the keynote lecture delivered by the first author at the First Indian symposium on Offshore Geotechnics (ISOG: 2019) held in Indian Institute of Technology (Bhubaneswar) in December 2019. Our world is in crisis due to effects of climate change, and one of the possible ways to limit further damage is to decarbonise the energy sources through renewable energy and by reducing the reliance on burning fossil fuel. Offshore wind farm has established itself as a matured technology, and many of the European countries are generating substantial portion of their energy requirements from this new technology. In this context, this paper has the following aims: (a) provide a historical view and evidence-based confidence of wind turbine technology; (b) show the potential of offshore wind in solving some of the grand technological challenges of our time; (c) present the technological and scientific challenges faced in the analysis and design offshore wind turbine foundation taking example case studies from Europe, China and potential seismic locations; (d) discuss the use of physical modelling to overcome some of the design challenges where possible, and reference to other work is provided for the benefit of the readers of our paper.