Saving Seafood

The ocean is a noisy place for sea life. What 2 years of listening tells us about offshore wind.

November 30, 2023 — The ocean can be a loud place — and that’s partly because of boats.

Fishing trawlers traverse the open water for their seasonal catch. Massive cargo ships travel to the ports with a boundless assortment of goods. And take your pick of recreational boats, from lumbering passenger cruises to high-speed motorboats.

Additional noise is expected from vessels building offshore wind farms up and down the Atlantic Coast from Maine to Virginia, as the budding industry seeks to reach a bevy of clean energy goals.

Read the full article at NJ.com

‘Maybe we were too optimistic’: Ørsted executive talks about offshore wind struggles

November 28, 2023 — It has been a hard year for Ørsted. High interest rates and supply chain bottlenecks have rocked the world’s largest offshore wind developer.

Earlier this month, Ørsted wrote down the value of its U.S. portfolio by $4 billion after canceling two projects off New Jersey. The company’s stock price has lost more than half its value since the start of the year, and it recently announced a reshuffling of its management team, with the departure of the company’s chief financial officer and chief operations officer.

David Hardy is one executive who has weathered the storm. He has led the Danish-based company’s operations in the U.S. since 2020. Hardy sat down for an interview Monday with E&E News at a critical time for the company.

Ørsted is preparing to submit a new bid for Sunrise Wind in New York after regulators there rejected the company’s request to charge consumers more for the 924-megawatt project’s electricity. In New Jersey, the company is bracing for a fight over $300 million in performance guarantees related to its Ocean Wind I project. And its partner, Eversource Energy, is looking to sell its stake in three offshore wind projects.

If that wasn’t enough, Ørsted has also been in talks with the White House over implementation of the Inflation Reduction Act. Hardy has called on the administration to revise its rules governing a domestic content bonus in a bid to make it easier for offshore wind developers to qualify for tax credits.

Last week, Ørsted announced the installation of the first turbine for South Fork Wind, a 132-MW project serving New York. Hardy said it could begin generating power by the end of this week. Ørsted has also begun work for Revolution Wind, a 704-MW project serving Connecticut and Rhode Island.

The conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.

It’s obviously been a difficult year. What lessons do you take from South Fork and Revolution moving forward — not just for Ørsted but for offshore wind in the U.S.?

Well, first off, these to me are bright spots in the industry right now. It’s easy to kind of be focused on the negatives. But here’s two projects that are in construction and moving along and, between the two of them, are over 800 megawatts of offshore wind, which will be powering over 400,000 homes in New England and New York with clean power. They’re also projects that are the foundation for the supply chain, the foundation for the operation and maintenance hub, the foundation for current and future union jobs, and all kinds of other things that the industry promised. And so I think our perseverance and commitment to getting these projects built says a lot. They’re still not amazing financial return projects, but we’ve been able to work through all the challenges in the industry … to take a positive final investment decision and progress these projects.

Read the full article at E&E News

Cape May County continuing federal offshore wind suit despite Ørsted backout

November 27, 2023 — Cape May County will continue challenging permitting for offshore wind development in New Jersey despite one company abandoning its plans to build wind turbines along the coast.

Michael Donohue, who represents the county in offshore wind matters, said the decision to not rescind its lawsuit was made because Ørsted has said in statements another company could take on the leases for the projects.

“It is clear that Ørsted has abandoned the development of Ocean Wind 1 and Ocean Wind 2, but it is also clear that they believe that they can sell their lease and their state and federal permits,” said Donohue. “For Ørsted to break every promise it made to multiple New Jersey communities, to break all the promises it made to trade unions in South Jersey, to break all of its contractual obligations with New Jersey agencies and then believe that it is entitled to profit from its lease and permits is the height of arrogance. The County of Cape May intends to challenge this proposition in federal and state court moving forward in connection with the litigation already underway.”

Read the full article at The Press of Atlantic City

NEW JERSEY: No Letup in Ocean City’s Fight Against Wind Farm Project

November 25, 2023 — Ocean City is taking its legal battle against an offshore wind energy farm to the next level, even though the company that was supposed to develop the project no longer plans to build it.

During a meeting Wednesday, City Council agreed to hire a law firm to represent Ocean City in its appeal against the state Board of Public Utilities over the agency’s approval of a transmission line that would have connected the offshore wind turbines to the land-based electric grid.

City Business Administrator George Savastano said the appeal is part of Ocean City’s ongoing legal strategy to oppose the wind farm, despite the developer’s announcement on Oct. 31 that it is withdrawing from the project.

“If it’s still active in the courts, it’s the city’s position that we should see this through,” Savastano said in an interview after the Council meeting.

He also noted that the city will continue its legal fight because there is the possibility that another company could come in and try to revive the wind farm project.

“This particular developer has withdrawn. That’s not to say that another project will not happen,” he said.

Earlier this year, the BPU granted an easement and regulatory permits for the wind farm’s underground transmission line, which would have come ashore at the 35th Street beach in Ocean City and crossed through environmentally sensitive wetlands along the route.

The line would have followed 35th Street to Bay Avenue, then north on Bay Avenue to Roosevelt Boulevard, west across Peck Bay at the 34th Street Bridge and then continued on to Route 9 to property near the former B.L. England power plant in Upper Township. Ultimately, it would have connected to an electric substation at the old plant.

In its ongoing legal fight, Ocean City is challenging the BPU’s authority to grant approval for the transmission line. The city also has argued that an alternative route for the line was never properly considered.

Read the full article at OCNJDaily

NEW JERSEY: Attentive Energy investing $10.6M in supply chain, startups to help New Jersey offshore wind

November 20, 2023 — A company proposing an offshore wind farm in New Jersey is investing $10.6 million in projects to help grow the industry’s supply chain and support ocean-based technology startup businesses in the state.

Attentive Energy is one of four projects proposed in New Jersey’s most recent round of solicitations for offshore wind projects. It is a collaboration between Houston-based Total Energies, and Corio Generation, with offices in Boston and London.

During an event at Brookdale Community College, Damian Bednarz, the company’s president, said Attentive Energy will invest $6.6 million in SeaAhead. That is a company that supports ocean-related technology firms; it will establish a business incubator program in New Jersey.

Read the full article the Associated Press

NEW JERSEY: With Ørsted’s offshore wind farms stopped, what will happen to $300M in guarantees?

November 13, 2023 — An offshore wind developer that is backing out of deals to build windfarms off New Jersey is under new criticism as the company attempts to pull out of paying millions of dollars in performance guarantees.

Denmark-based Ørsted announced last month it would not build two wind energy farms off the southern New Jersey coastline, despite initial approvals from New Jersey and federal officials.

This month, the company sent a letter to the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities stating it withdrawing a Compliance Filing on its Ocean Wind 1 project. The company had deposited $200 million into escrow for the project, which would be put toward manufacturing facilities for turbine monopiles in Paulsboro, Gloucester County, according to board documents.

Read the full article at app.

Fallout as Ørsted unwinds Ocean Wind 1 project

November 7, 2023 — After dropping its flagship U.S. project Ocean Wind, Ørsted is seeking to pull back $300 million in obligations to New Jersey.

Once its board of directors had decided to kill the 1,100-megawatt plan on Oct. 31, the next day Ørsted notified the state Board of Public Utilities that it wants to get back a $100 million guarantee that it would complete the project. The company is also pulling back on $200 million it had planned to invest with steel fabricator EEW for its monopile foundation manufacturing plan in Paulsboro, N.J.

Ørsted and state officials signed off on those promises just weeks before the surprise announcement that Ocean Wind 1 and 2 would not be built – a move that Ørsted CEO Mads Nipper said would address more than 70 percent of the company’s recent $2.3 billion writedown of its assets in the beleaguered U.S. offshore wind market.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

Orsted wants out of $300M forfeiture for scrapped New Jersey offshore wind farms

November 7, 2023 — Offshore wind power company Orsted is trying to get out of a $300 million guarantee it agreed to pay New Jersey in the event it failed to build its first wind farm off the state’s coast.

Last Tuesday, the Danish firm scrapped its Ocean Wind I and II projects in southern New Jersey, saying the projects were no longer financially feasible. The company cited supply chain issues, inflation and a failure to gain enough government tax credits.

The next day, Orsted wrote to the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities, saying it was withdrawing from an agreement it signed with the state under which it would forfeit the money if it did not build Ocean Wind I.

Read the full article at the Associated Press

Offshore wind projects face economic storm. Cancellations jeopardize Biden clean energy goals

November 6, 2023 — The cancellation of two large offshore wind projects in New Jersey is the latest in a series of setbacks for the nascent U.S. offshore wind industry, jeopardizing the Biden administration’s goals of powering 10 million homes from towering ocean-based turbines by 2030 and establishing a carbon-free electric grid five years later.

The Danish wind energy developer Ørsted said this week it’s scrapping its Ocean Wind I and II projects off southern New Jersey due to problems with supply chains, higher interest rates and a failure to obtain the amount of tax credits the company wanted. Together, the projects were supposed to deliver over 2.2 gigawatts of power.

The news comes after developers in New England canceled power contacts for three projects that would have provided another 3.2 gigawatts of wind power to Massachusetts and Connecticut. They said their projects were no longer financially feasible.

Read the full article at the Associated Press

Phil Murphy’s New Jersey Wind Flop

November 6, 2023 — Phil Murphy huffed and he puffed, and a giant wind boondoggle blew the New Jersey Governor down. That’s the story of another failed green-energy project, as the follies keep being exposed.

The renewable energy firm Ørsted last week backed out of two megaprojects along the Jersey shore that it started planning in 2019. With his eye on support from the climate lobby for a White House run, Mr. Murphy courted the developments, which were meant to provide electricity for hundreds of thousands of homes. The company says cost overruns have made them impossible, and it wrote off $4 billion for the first nine months of this year.

Mr. Murphy fumed in public, saying the cancellation casts doubt on Ørsted’s “credibility and competence.” The Danish firm blames its withdrawal on rising interest rates and component costs, but it has said little about what made the New Jersey project uniquely impractical. At least for now, the company is moving ahead with wind farms in New England and Maryland.

Read the full article at the Wall Street Journal