Saving Seafood

Trump’s Offshore Oil Ban to Halt Coastal Wind Farms Too

September 30, 2020 — President Donald Trump’s decision to rule out energy development along the coasts of Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas will bar not just offshore oil and gas drilling — but coastal wind farms too.

The broad reach of Trump’s recent orders, which was confirmed by the Interior Department agency that oversees offshore energy development, comes as renewable developers are spending hundreds of millions of dollars snapping up the rights to build wind farms along the U.S. East Coast.

At issue are recent Trump memos ruling out new oil and gas leasing along Florida, Georgia and South and North Carolina from July 1, 2022 until June 30, 2032, issued after some Republicans pressed for a drilling ban and as the president courts voters concerned about the environment. On Friday, Trump said he would expand the offshore energy moratorium to include Virginia, though he has not yet issued a directive encompassing the territory.

Read the full story at Bloomberg

Nearly 50 Fishing Industry Leaders Call For More Funding For NMFS And Other Changes To OFFSHORE Act

September 29, 2020 — The following was released by the Responsible Offshore Development Alliance:

48 fishing industry leaders representing fishing organizations from across the country submitted a letter yesterday to the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources recommending improvements to the OFFSHORE Act. These proposed changes would ensure that research and mitigation funds are properly directed and efficiently used, and that federal labor standards are applied consistently to offshore development activities.

The OFFSHORE Act, officially the Opening Federal Financial Sharing to Heighten Opportunities for Renewable Energy Act of 2020, would make several changes to how offshore wind construction is conducted and how research funds are allocated. It would allocate a large portion of offshore wind lease sales to state governments, and allocate some to the National Oceans and Coastal Security Fund for research grants. It would also extend provisions of the Jones Act to require offshore wind developers to use American labor for production activities.

In their letter, the industry leaders called on the Senate to direct OFFSHORE Act funding to the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to “conduct research, planning and environmental review, and fisheries monitoring.” Fully funding NMFS is “the highest research funding priority for any bill addressing [offshore wind],” they wrote, because NMFS has the expertise to contribute to the development process, but faces potentially severe disruptions to its work and currently lacks the resources to keep pace with new developments. These disruptions include a loss of access for its survey efforts, which rely on low levels of scientific uncertainty to accurately inform stock assessments and sustainable fisheries catch levels. NMFS also has the unique ability to conduct cooperative research, which is key to ensuring inclusivity among fishery and regional stakeholders.

Read the full release here

Wind Farm Companies Agree To Compensate Fishermen And Monitor EMF Emissions

September 24, 2020 — Following months of negotiations with interested parties, skeptics and outright opponents of the South Fork Wind Farm, the project’s developers have submitted a new outline of their construction proposal that adds a number of new conditions that bow somewhat to the demands of fishermen, environmentalists and lawmakers.

The developers have agreed to a compensation plan for commercial fishermen who may suffer damaged or lost gear or lose fishing days because of some component of the wind farm’s construction and operation. They have also agreed to conduct monitoring of electromagnetic pulses from the power cable over the first five years of the wind farm’s operations and a mandated re-nourishment of the beach at Beach Lane if erosion from storms exposes the cable or significantly lessens the depth at which it is buried.

The new outline, called a “joint proposal,” also puts a finer point on the myriad details of how the construction will be conducted on land in Wainscott, with strict parameters for the timing of work, noise impacts, access to roads and beaches during construction and the extent to which the areas of work are restored at the conclusion of construction.

Read the full story at the Sag Harbor Express

The 2020 Election And The Future Of Offshore Wind Power In The U.S.

September 23, 2020 — There are nine offshore wind projects currently on the drawing board for the Atlantic coast. Northeast governors need those wind turbines to help meet their states’ clean energy goals, and are competing for the land-based businesses that will supply the new industry — and could bring tens of thousands of jobs to the region. Industry analysts estimate that investment in U.S. offshore wind could hit $108 billion by 2030.

But this blue-sky vision has one large uncertainty: Donald Trump.

“I never understood wind,” the president said last December. “You know I know windmills very much. I’ve studied it better than anybody. I know it’s very expensive.”

Trump says windmills, as he calls them, are also noisy, ugly and cause cancer.

But as the election approaches there are signs the Trump administration’s position on wind energy could be shifting.

Read the full story at WBUR

Congress could act to limit foreign workers in U.S. offshore wind

September 23, 2020 — The following is an excerpt from a story originally published by National Fisherman:

Foreign-flag vessels and crews employed in the early stages of U.S. offshore wind energy are undercutting opportunities for American mariners, an industry spokesman told members of Congress Tuesday.

At an average pay around $70,000 “marine jobs are just the kind of jobs that government policy should be promoting, said Aaron Smith, executive director of the Offshore Marine Services Association told members of the House Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources.

But during 2020, 12 to 15 foreign flag vessels were working on wind energy projects in Northeast U.S. waters, compared to eight to 10 U.S. flag vessels, Smith estimated.

Operated by companies often based in Norway and the United Kingdom, the vessels are typically manned by mariners from nations including Russia, Ukraine and India, paid about half compared to pay rates for U.S. mariners – at a time when 11,000 American mariners have lost work during the covid-19 pandemic, said Smith.

Smith said members of his association have reported losing contracts to foreign vessels whose owners can outbid with 25 percent lower day rates. Those foreign crews work in the industry under a special visa program for mariners that should be reformed, said Smith.

“I think those (crew) visas should follow the nationality of the (vessel) owner. If you have a Norwegian vessel, you should hire a Norwegian crew. If you don’t want to hire Norwegians, you should be employing an American crew,” he said.

Subcommittee chairman Rep. Alan Lowenthal said he and colleague Rep. John Garamendi, both D-Calif., will sponsor an amendment to the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act to address the situation Smith talked about.

There is a long history of OMSA and its supporters in Congress pushing to preserve Jones Act protections for the U.S. offshore industry from more foreign competition. That’s been focused for years on the Gulf of Mexico oil and gas industry, but now offshore wind is the new arena.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

NJ legislators call to suspend offshore wind approval

September 16, 2020 — A trio of New Jersey legislators who have promoted offshore wind energy development have called for suspending state approval of Ørsted’s Ocean Wind project, alleging the company has so far “failed to deliver” on its promises of new jobs and economic development in the state.

In a Sept. 9 letter to state utility regulators, New Jersey state Senate president Steve Sweeney and Assembly members John Burzichelli and Adam Taliaferro, all Democrats with strong ties to construction and industrial union labor, cited pledges by Ørsted to hire all union labor, provide grants to spur business owned by minorities and women, and build monopile foundations in the state.

“We are starting to speak with our colleagues throughout the Northeast about their experiences with wind energy companies, including Ørsted,” they state in the letter. “We are asking if these companies, including Ørsted, have made the same representations in other states and have equally failed to deliver.”

The state Board of Public Utilities, which in June 2019 approved use of renewable energy credits for the Ocean Wind project, should ask regulators in other states if wind developers’ economic guarantees have borne fruit yet, say the legislators, who sponsored a 2010 law requiring that wind developers provide certain economic benefits to the New Jersey economy.

“If these concerns are validated, we request that you terminate the award and immediately commence a new and more transparent process for offshore wind project applicants,” they wrote. “This is of the utmost importance given the significant amount of public money being utilized to fund this project.”

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Hampton Roads plan to bring offshore wind supply chain to region gets GO Virginia funding

September 15, 2020 — A plan to bring the makers of huge offshore wind turbines to Hampton Roads has gained financial support from Virginia’s statewide economic development initiative.

GO Virginia has awarded a $529,788 grant to the Hampton Roads Alliance to attract a supply chain for the offshore wind industry to the region. The economic development agency will lead a team of organizations in the project, including the Port of Virginia, the state Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy, the Virginia Economic Development Partnership, Old Dominion University and local chambers of commerce.

Part of the grant will be used to hire two staff positions at the economic development alliance, one of which has been filled. Matt Smith started two weeks ago as director of offshore wind for the organization. The alliance also plans to hire a marketing specialist. Alliance President and CEO Doug Smith declined to reveal the salaries of the two positions.

As part of the grant terms, the economic development alliance will provide matching funding, Doug Smith said. The economic development alliance will also continue to fully fund the program going forward. The Alliance is funded by 11 member localities — Chesapeake, Franklin, Hampton, Isle of Wight County, Newport News, Norfolk, Poquoson, Portsmouth, Southampton County, Suffolk and Virginia Beach — and more than 70 private-sector investors.

Read the full story at Inside Business

RHODE ISLAND: Ratepayers On Hook for Portion of Block Island Wind Farm Cable Mess

September 15, 2020 — National Grid and Deepwater Wind, now Ørsted, were given a break by Rhode Island’s Coastal Resources Management Council (CRMC) when the agency granted the use of a cost-saving method for burying the Block Island Wind Farm power cables at a New Shoreham beach. Both companies now likely regret that decision.

National Grid, which owns the high-voltage power line from Block Island to Narragansett, expects to pay $30 million for its share of the reconstruction, which will require horizontal directional drilling. The state’s primary electric utility will recover the expense through an undetermined surcharge on ratepayers’ bills.

“While exact bill impacts won’t be available for some time, we don’t anticipate major fluctuations to those charges with these needed repairs,” National Grid spokesperson Ted Kresse said.

The power line from the five-turbine Block Island Wind Farm reaches shore at Fred Benson Town Beach and leaves New Shoreham for Narragansett at Crescent Beach to the north. But keeping portions of the cable buried at Crescent Beach has been a struggle.

Read the full story at EcoRI

Offshore Wind Energy Will Deliver Few U.S. Jobs; Lack of Oversight Means Most Jobs Will Be Overseas

September 15, 2020 — The following was released by the Responsible Offshore Development Alliance:

New developments have raised serious questions regarding the economic and job benefits from offshore wind energy projects in U.S. waters. Unsubstantiated claims of significant economic growth and investment have exaggerated the benefits of offshore wind energy, and diminished the economic and cultural importance of sustainable American wild-caught fisheries.

Georgetown Economic Services: Benefits of Offshore Wind ‘Grossly Inflated’

A new study, conducted by Georgetown Economic Services (GES), finds that “[t]he claim that the huge investments in offshore wind would provide significant job and economic benefits in the U.S. has been grossly inflated.” The study also reaches an important conclusion: many of the jobs and benefits would actually go to the foreign-owned companies currently dominating the wind energy landscape, instead of creating local opportunities.

The study examined the potential permanent and temporary jobs that would be created by wind energy development in New England and the Mid-Atlantic, and the Vineyard Wind project in particular. It found that estimates for domestic permanent jobs are 3-4 times lower than those promised by the wind industry, and that companies will need to spend millions importing turbines and other equipment from Europe, as the U.S. lacks the relevant infrastructure.

“A careful investigation of the employment impact shows a surprisingly low number of positions at the more permanent level of actual operation and maintenance of the offshore wind electricity,” the study found.

Astonishingly, GES estimates of temporary employment were actually higher than wind energy industry estimates, indicating that temporary construction jobs are expected to go to skilled international workers rather than be sourced locally. Specifically, it found “the bulk of the jobs will be created overseas rather than here at home, and total domestic employment in manufacturing and construction is small when compared with employment in the manufacture of conventional equipment for power generation.”

Ignoring a Century of Jones Act Precedent

This troubling report arrives in the midst of a murky policy atmosphere. Vessels and crews from Europe constructed the two existing U.S. offshore wind energy projects without documentation of any domestic job creation, and there is no apparent movement toward requiring U.S. labor or materials in future projects.

The Jones Act requires items shipped within the U.S. to be transported on vessels that are built, owned, and operated by American citizens or permanent residents. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), however, has never issued guidance as to how this law applies to offshore wind energy.

In July, CBP issued a “ruling letter” stating that the installation of turbines for the Vineyard Wind project using a non-Jones Act qualified (i.e. foreign-flagged) jack-up vessel would not violate the Jones Act. CBP then abruptly revoked that ruling just a few weeks later, citing uncertainty whether the Jones Act extends to wind energy activities more than 3 miles offshore at all. This appears to create a blanket exemption absent congressional or judicial action, despite the fishing industry’s subjugation to protectionist laws and other industries’ similarly heavy regulation under “Buy America” provisions.

This cannot be the government’s intended consequence. One could make a reasonable argument for the use of European jack-up vessels for limited offshore construction, as occurs in oil and gas, when such vessels do not exist in the U.S. But granting carte blanche to bypass domestic investment in a new heavy industry is economically and politically myopic, particularly given the burgeoning offshore wind energy industry in countries like China that are at the cusp of becoming key competitors in this field.

Manhattan Institute: “The Dismal Economics of Offshore Wind”

The GES study’s findings are consistent with other recent reports finding issues with how offshore wind energy is being promoted and developed. A study recently released by the Manhattan Institute also criticized the long-term economic prospects of offshore wind power, finding that “[a]bsent continued subsidies… it is unlikely that any offshore wind facilities will be developed.” The actual costs to ratepayers are likely far greater than advertised in part because experience from Europe has shown “that the performance of offshore wind turbines degrades rapidly.”

Unions Cast Doubt on Domestic Workforce Benefits

The quality of offshore wind jobs is also in question. A North America’s Building Trades Unions report examining the difference across energy industries found that tradespeople “consider projects in oil and natural gas to have better perceived wages, benefits, and opportunities than renewables projects,” and that those projects have longer durations. Moreover, it found “skilled trade jobs are not highly interchangeable between [the natural gas and renewables] industries.”

Failure to Consider Negative Effects on Seafood Sector Employment

In July, a study from the Science Center for Marine Fisheries found that officials at the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) were not giving sufficient attention to the potential negative impact of offshore wind on existing ocean use jobs. Estimates of economic and employment benefits promoted by wind energy advocates also consistently ignore the displacement of jobs and revenue from fishing and existing energy industries.

Preservation of Fisheries Jobs Demands Caution and Oversight

As the federal government deliberates approval of Vineyard Wind—the first such commercial-scale project in the United States—the American public should be highly concerned over misrepresentation of the economic benefits of offshore wind energy. Many state governments and well-funded trade associations are promoting this new industry as a major win for states and ports, providing both jobs and economic growth. However, once permits are issued there is currently no way to monitor or enforce the fulfillment of these promises. Reasoned decisions depend on verification of these claims before jeopardizing the industries that already support our coastal communities.

NEW JERSEY: Offshore Wind Promised New Jobs and Economic Development. Where Are They?

September 14, 2020 — With New Jersey ramping up its efforts to develop a robust offshore wind program, new doubts have been raised over when and whether the projects will deliver the significant economic benefits and jobs touted by developers.

The issue became public Wednesday when the state opened a second solicitation to build offshore wind farms off the Jersey coast and prominent legislators unexpectedly called on state regulators to immediately suspend its review of the first and only offshore wind project to be approved by the Board of Public Utilities.

It follows a letter from a group representing commercial fishermen in New Jersey sent to the BPU and state Department of Environmental Protection, urging the agency to establish a five-year moratorium on the development of offshore wind projects, citing concerns over their impact on New Jersey’s lucrative commercial fishery industry. A similar letter subsequently was sent to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, the federal agency overseeing offshore wind development, echoing a call for a national moratorium.

These issues have been bubbling for months in behind-the-scene discussions among lawmakers, administration officials and Ørsted, according to participants. The focus has been over the $1 billion, 1,100-megawatt Ocean Wind project located 15 miles off Atlantic City, according to Assemblyman John Burzichelli, a powerful Democrat from South Jersey, who signed the letter to BPU with running mates Assemblyman Adam Taliaferro and Senate President Stephen Sweeney.

Read the full story at the NJ Spotlight