03.29.21

Chair Grijalva Hails Major New Biden Administration Investments in Offshore Wind

Washington, D.C. – Chair Raúl M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.) today hailed the Biden administration’s announcement of wide-ranging investments to support responsible expansion of the offshore wind industry and prioritize the construction of 30 gigawatts of new offshore wind power by 2030, an effort expected to put tens of thousands of Americans to work in good-paying unionized jobs and make the nation’s energy grid more climate-compatible. The moves announced today, Grijalva said, are another sign that the Biden administration means what it says about tackling the climate crisis and strengthening America’s economy.

Grijalva called the announcement a terrific first move on offshore wind for newly installed Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, highlighting the continuity with her record as a leading member of the Natural Resources Committee.

“The positive contrast with the Trump administration couldn’t be more obvious,” Grijalva said today. “The Biden administration has made a genuine commitment to clean energy and a strong economy and is following through with action. The country needs strong economic, scientific, and environmental leadership from the White House, and the country is going to benefit tremendously while President Biden and his team continue to make the right moves in a timely way.”

Today’s announcements include:

  • The Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) is announcing a new Wind Energy Area in the New York Bight—an area of shallow waters between Long Island and the New Jersey coast—which a recent study from Wood Mackenzie shows can support up to 25,000 development and construction jobs from 2022 to 2030, as well as an additional 7,000 jobs in communities supported by this development.
  • The Departments of Interior (DOI), Energy (DOE), and Commerce (DOC) are announcing a shared goal to deploy 30 gigawatts (GW) of offshore wind in the United States by 2030, while protecting biodiversity and promoting ocean co-use. Meeting this target will trigger more than $12 billion per year in capital investment in projects on both U.S. coasts, create tens of thousands of good-paying, union jobs, with more than 44,000 workers employed in offshore wind by 2030 and nearly 33,000 additional jobs in communities supported by offshore wind activity. It will also generate enough power to meet the demand of more than 10 million American homes for a year, and avoid 78 million metric tons of CO2 emissions.
  • BOEM is announcing a Notice of Intent (NOI) to prepare an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for Ocean Wind, putting it in line to become America’s third commercial scale offshore wind project, after Vineyard Wind in Massachusetts and South Fork in Rhode Island. Ocean Wind has proposed an offshore wind project with a total capacity of 1,100 megawatts (MW) — enough to power 500,000 homes across New Jersey.
  • The U.S. Department of Transportation’s (DOT) Maritime Administration today is announcing a Notice of Funding Opportunity for port authorities and other applicants to apply for $230 million for port and intermodal infrastructure-related projects through the Port Infrastructure Development Program.
  • DOE’s Loan Programs Office (LPO) released a fact sheet to facilitate access for the offshore wind industry for $3 billion in funding through LPO’s Title XVII Innovative Energy Loan Guarantee Program.
  • The National Offshore Wind Research and Development Consortium (NOWRDC), created by the DOE and the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA), is announcing the award of $8 million to 15 offshore wind research and development projects that were selected through a competitive process. The new projects will focus on offshore support structure innovation, supply chain development, electrical systems innovation, and mitigation of use conflicts that will help reduce barriers and costs for offshore wind deployment.
  • The Department of Commerce’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is signing a Memorandum of Agreement with Ørsted, an offshore wind development company, to share physical and biological data in Ørsted-leased waters subject to U.S. jurisdiction. This agreement is the first of its kind between an offshore wind developer and NOAA, and paves the way for future data-sharing agreements that NOAA expects to enter into with other developers.
  • NOAA’s Northeast Sea Grant programs, in partnership with DOE, DOC, and NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center, is releasing a request for research proposals to support more than $1 million in grant funding to improve understanding of offshore renewable energy for the benefit of a diversity of stakeholders, including fishing and coastal communities.

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