Dealing a stunning financial blow to a controversial renewable energy project off the New England Coast, the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) on October 21 rejected a grant application for $456 million to build offshore wind turbines and install them on floating platforms in the Gulf of Maine. [emphasis, links added]
The decision marks a setback for Maine Gov. Janet Mills (D), a coterie of environmental groups, and – in an odd twist – the Biden-Harris administration, an enthusiastic backer of offshore wind projects.
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg announced the awarding of more than $4.2 billion in grants for 44 green-energy projects nationwide. DOT officials did not say why the Maine project was not among the recipients.
Unlike traditional offshore wind installations, in which giant turbines are anchored to the ocean floor, the Maine project is designed to be a port, where turbines are to be assembled at what is essentially a boatyard.
The turbines are then transported to and mounted on floating platforms at sea, where they are attached to the ocean floor using flexible anchors, chains, or steel cables.
From the beginning, however, the Maine project encountered stiff local resistance.
After some wrangling, the project’s backers settled on state-owned Sears Island, “the largest undeveloped, uninhabited, causeway-accessible island on the eastern coast of the United States,” according to State Representative Regan Paul (R).
“Sears Island has long been known as a place of tranquility and home to abundant wildlife, migratory birds, botanical resources, and historical sites,” Paul, who led the fight against the project, points out. “It boasts a wealth of Wabanaki [tribal] history as well as historical sites dating back to the Revolutionary War.”
Floating wind turbines are still in the experimental stage, and the State of Maine has yet to conduct a thorough assessment of the Sears Island project’s environmental and economic impacts.
An indication of what could be in store for coastal Maine – and anyplace else considering such a project – was provided by a September 2023 report from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).
Though the report focused on the impacts of floating wind turbine development on the West Coast, its conclusions are a cautionary tale for projects like the one in Maine.
The NREL study says communities likely to be impacted by the development of a wind port will face “diverse environmental, health, educational, economic, and accessibility burdens that could impact how much they benefit from new or expanded ports and job opportunities…”
That finding was echoed by a recent Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) assessment of the Vinyard Wind Project off the coast of Massachusetts.
BOEM concluded that a wind port upgrade would increase revenues and create some jobs but would lead to displacement or reduction of commercial and recreational fishing opportunities, potential harm to wildlife, increased vessel traffic and noise, visual impairment of the seaside scenery during daytime and nighttime hours, and disturbances of cultural resources.
This comes at a time when the commercial viability of offshore wind energy – both stationary and floating – is in doubt thanks to the failure of numerous projects along the Atlantic Coast.
The Biden administration pledged to install 30,000 megawatts of offshore wind power by 2030, but the rollout has fallen far short of expectations.
Currently, the U.S. has only two operational, industrial-scale wind facilities – one in Massachusetts and the other in Rhode Island.
In addition to ongoing inflation, supply chain bottlenecks and high interest rates have boosted the already substantial upfront costs of offshore wind power.
While some states, including Maine after DOT rejected the Sears Island grant, are eager to stay in the hunt, offshore wind’s contribution to the “clean energy transition” is still likely to face delays.
For residential and commercial power customers in Maine, the proposed Sears Island project would result in higher utility bills.
The current fixed-bottom offshore wind costs are $95 per megawatt hour as opposed to $145 per megawatt hour for floating wind turbines, according to Blackridge Research & Consulting.
Both are intermittent and the part-time energy they produce will never meet the demands of a full-time economy.
Rep. Paul, whose coastal district would host the wind port, is supported in her opposition to the project by local citizens, assisted by the Washington-based Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT).
Her arguments go far beyond dollars and cents by putting today’s government-backed energy transition into perspective.
“The climate has been changing ever since the earth started turning, and it will continue to change long after us,” she notes. “There is no climate crisis that justifies Maine taking these extremely damaging actions, as Maine accounts for a mere .000098 percent of the world’s carbon emissions.”
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