LONDON (Reuters) - The British government has approved construction of a 500-megawatt offshore wind farm in Cumbria, northwest England, the government said yesterday.

It said the Duddon Sands farm, planned near Walney Island off the coast of Barrow-in-Furness, was one of the country's three largest offshore wind farms approved so far. It would comprise up to 139 turbines.

Morecambe Wind Ltd, a consortium of Scottish Power, Eurus Energy from Japan and Denmark's state-controlled DONG Energy, is to build and operate the farm.

An industry official said it would take several years to build a wind farm of this scale and that it would require investment of well over £1 billion ($1.8 billion).