June 3, 2024 — The Maine Department of Transportation recently announced that it had applied for a $456 million federal grant to build a wind port on Sears Island.
The announcement marks another step in what will be a years-long effort by state officials to build out Maine’s third port, one that can support a nascent floating wind industry.
And though Maine has been discussing the possibility of a wind port for several years, a clearer picture of the plans is now beginning to form.
June 3, 2024 — New Jersey will receive $125 million as part of a settlement over Ørsted’s withdrawal from two offshore wind farms last year, Gov. Phil Murphy announced Tuesday, an amount that is less than half of what Murphy once said the company was required to pay the state.
The settlement funds paid by the Danish wind giant over its pullout from Ocean Wind 1 and 2, two 1,100 megawatt wind farms off New Jersey’s Coast, will be used to fund wind development and other renewable energy programs, the governor’s office said. But at least one Democratic lawmaker said the money should be sent back to New Jersey ratepayers as a matter of policy.
“The [Board of Public Utilities] ought to be looking for New Jersey ratepayers first, and these moneys should be reserved to reduce ratepayers’ bills when these projects come on board, and it should be a BPU policy,” said Sen. Joe Cryan (D-Union)
Last July, Gov. Phil Murphy signed a bill that would have allowed Ørsted to retain federal tax credits that would otherwise go to offset consumers’ power bills by roughly $2.40 per ratepayer per year. In return for those subsidies, the wind firm was required to post a $100 million performance security and place $200 million for wind project investments into an escrow account.
May 30, 2024 — The federal government has granted the state of Maine a lease for a floating offshore wind research station nearly 30 miles off the southern coast.
The dozen turbines located southeast of Portland would be the first floating, offshore wind research site ever deployed in federal waters. The administration of Gov. Janet Mills requested the lease from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) in 2021, kicking off a multi-year process that involved an environmental assessment, public meetings and engagement with the commercial fishing community.
The stated goal of the research project is to study the technology and how it interacts with the surrounding environment and marine life as well as ways to reduce potential conflicts with existing uses, such as commercial fishing. The research could then influence development of commercial-scale offshore wind in the Gulf of Maine, which Mills has made a critical piece of her administration’s ambitious climate goals.
“Offshore wind offers our state a tremendous opportunity to harness abundant clean energy in our own backyard, to create good-paying jobs and drive economic development, and to reduce our over-reliance on fossil fuels and fight climate change,” Mills said in a statement. “This offer of a lease is a major milestone in our effort to embrace these significant economic and environmental benefits for Maine and Maine people and is a recognition of our nation-leading work to responsibly develop this promising industry.”
May 30, 2024 — On April 30, 2024, the Interior Department announced its proposal for an offshore wind energy auction in the Gulf of Maine. The proposed sale would include eight lease areas offshore Maine, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire, totaling nearly one million acres, which have the potential to generate approximately 15 GW of clean, renewable energy and power for over five million homes.
On May 1, 2024, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) published a Proposed Sale Notice (PSN) in the Federal Register, initiating a 60-day public comment period ending on July 1, 2024. To comment on the PSN, go here and search for docket number BOEM-2024-0026.
May 30, 2024 – A federal judge at the United States District Court for the District of Columbia has denied a preliminary injunction filed against Dominion Energy to halt construction of the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind Project.
In March, a coalition of three conservative groups filed a lawsuit against the utility company and several federal agencies, claiming the agencies had issued an incomplete biological opinion clearing the project for construction. The agencies were legally obligated to issue a more comprehensive biological opinion, the plaintiffs alleged, assessing the threat Virginia’s offshore wind farm posed to the endangered North Atlantic right whale in conjunction with all the other East Coast offshore wind farms whose operation and installation is now being pursued.
May 29, 2024 — A federal judge has denied a request from a coalition of conservative interest groups that sought to halt construction of Dominion Energy’s offshore wind farm in Virginia Beach.
The groups sued the Biden administration earlier this year, arguing federal agencies ignored threats to endangered whales when approving the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project.
The suit will still move forward this fall, but the decision issued last week denied plaintiffs’ request for a preliminary injunction to stop construction while the lawsuit is decided.
U.S. District Court Judge Loren AliKhan said there wasn’t enough proof that plaintiffs would suffer irreparable harm from construction on the project moving forward.
“Plaintiffs fail to take into account the extensive measures already in place to minimize potential harm to the (North Atlantic) Right Whale during construction,” AliKhan wrote. They “have not explained why these measures would not be sufficient.”
May 29, 2024 — New Jersey’s first offshore wind farm is one major step closer to reality with the release of a critical federal study.
The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management last week released its Final Environmental Impact Statement for the Atlantic Shores South Wind Project. The company behind the development, Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind, is a joint venture between Shell and EDF Renewables.
Plans for Atlantic Shores South call for up to 200 wind turbines across a lease area that spans more than 100,000 acres and is less than nine miles from Long Beach Island at its closest point to shore. The transmission cables that will carry electricity generated by the turbines are planned to come onshore in Atlantic City and Sea Girt.
May 29, 2024 — Police officers filled Central Regional High School on Tuesday night, where tensions ran high as critics and proponents of electricity generated by offshore wind faced off with impassioned speeches during a hearing held by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection.
The state agency held the event to collect public feedback on permit applications for proposed landfall sites for cables that, if approved, will transmit electricity from the Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind South project to the mainland power grid.
Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind — which is looking to erect about 200 wind turbines between Atlantic City and Barnegat Light — needs a series of permits from the state environmental protection agency before the company can build transmission lines and electrical substations at landfall sites along the Jersey Shore. The company has proposed its electric cables come onshore at Atlantic City, Sea Girt and Egg Harbor Township in Atlantic County.
May 29, 2024 — The federal government has granted the state of Maine a lease for a floating offshore wind research station nearly 30 miles off the southern coast.
The dozen turbines located southeast of Portland would be the first floating, offshore wind research site ever deployed in federal waters. The administration of Gov. Janet Mills requested the lease from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) in 2021, kicking off a multi-year process that involved an environmental assessment, public meetings and engagement with the commercial fishing community.
The stated goal of the research project is to study the technology and how it interacts with the surrounding environment and marine life as well as ways to reduce potential conflicts with existing uses, such as commercial fishing. The research could then influence development of commercial-scale offshore wind in the Gulf of Maine, which Mills has made a critical piece of her administration’s ambitious climate goals.
May 28, 2024 — Opponents of offshore wind energy farms warned during a rally Saturday in Ocean City that the legal battle is far from over in their efforts to prevent what they called the “industrialization of our ocean.”
Last year, the Danish energy company Orsted scrapped plans to build two wind farms off the South Jersey coast after concluding that the projects would not be worth the enormous development cost.
However, opponents stressed during the rally that Orsted still holds the leases giving it rights to build the wind farms and could either revive them or sell them to another company that would develop the projects.
“It’s not over. Stay in the fight,” said former Superior Court Judge Michael Donohue, who has headed Cape May County’s legal strategy to block the wind farms.