Maine Plans to Use Offshore Wind for Half Its Vitality Wants by 2040

AUGUSTA, Maine (AP) — Maine will procure at the least 3,000 megawatts of electrical energy from offshore wind generators by 2040 beneath a invoice signed Thursday by Democratic Gov. Janet Mills, sufficient to energy about half of the state’s electrical energy load.

Incentives to make sure wind energy builders keep away from profitable lobster fishing grounds are included within the regulation, which places Maine on a path to catch up with different states that have already got offshore wind tasks. The regulation units a timeline for requests for offshore proposals, in addition to requirements for port growth and development jobs.

Not like different tasks within the area, the Gulf of Maine wind generators would showcase floating platform know-how as a result of the water is simply too deep for generators to be anchored to the ocean ground. State officers hope corporations will make the most of know-how from the College of Maine, which has been pioneering precast floating generators and has examined prototypes off the coast.

“Offshore wind, carried out responsibly, provides Maine the chance to safe plentiful clear vitality, steady vitality costs, good-paying jobs and a more healthy surroundings for future generations,” Mills stated in an announcement.

The timeline requires the federal lease gross sales to be accomplished subsequent yr and for the state to launch requests for proposals to function the offshore wind generators in early 2026.

“The clear message to the clear vitality trade is that Maine is able to lead, come work with us,” stated Habib Dagher, director of the College of Maine’s Superior Buildings and Composites Middle.

The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Vitality Administration gave the inexperienced mild earlier this month for New Jersey’s first offshore wind farm to start development and beforehand accepted tasks beneath development off Massachusetts, New York and Rhode Island.

State Sen. Mark Lawrence, the invoice’s sponsor, thanked his colleagues for agreeing to a compromise after the governor vetoed an earlier version over considerations that labor provisions would have excluded many Maine employees. “This invoice will imply jobs, decrease and extra steady vitality costs whereas combating local weather change on the similar time,” he stated.

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