David Wojcik
My research report—Maine’s massive “floating wind” folly—is posted on the website of the Net Zero Reality Alliance, hosted by CFACT, which sponsored the research. See https://www.cfact.org/netzerorealitycoalition/ where there are many other studies.
What follows is my executive summary, followed by the latest bad news about this ongoing silly saga.
“Executive summary
This report explores several fundamental aspects of Maine's offshore wind development plans. It is divided into two parts. Part 1 explores some economic issues such as feasibility, cost and progress to date. Part 2 explores the proposed development as it relates to the entire Gulf of Maine, that is, because the project has not yet progressed to the point of determining Maine's liability.
The offshore wind plan calls for the development of 3,000 megawatts of generating capacity, roughly twice the average electricity use in Maine. The viability of Maine’s offshore wind plans depends entirely on a massive transition of the state’s grid from fossil fuel use to electrification. Clearly, the citizens of Maine have not been informed of this monumental transformation requirement. Of course they didn't approve.
Offshore wind power facilities will consist of a large number of “floating turbines” whose operational scale and reliability have yet to be proven in the real world. Such assumptions make the entire plan not only technically speculative, but also highly risky.
Extrapolated to today's small facility costs, the project would cost about $100 billion. This number is likely to rise significantly once large-scale hurricane protection technology is developed and adopted (if at all). It is important for Maine citizens to be aware of this significant cost and the much higher cost of electrification required to get it operational.
Maine has begun developing facilities to manufacture floating wind turbines. The effort appears entirely dependent on securing a nearly half-billion-dollar grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation. But the grant may be illegal because the plan is to fund highway projects, not offshore wind development. We will explore this in this report.
In terms of environmental impact, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) is leasing 15,000 MW of offshore wind development sites in the Gulf of Maine. A proposed 3,000 megawatts of development projects in Maine would come from some of these sites.
BOEM's environmental assessment for the lease does not include the impacts of constructing and operating 15,000 megawatts of generating capacity. They said only the impact of individual leasehold rights would be assessed. This approach is wrong because the full life cycle impacts need to be assessed before leasing, including the combined impact of all leases. A cumulative impact assessment is critical as it may affect the viability and nature of the lease.
Assessing the impact of this plan on endangered whales, particularly the endangered North Atlantic right whale, also requires “cumulative impacts”. The Gulf of Maine is designated critical habitat for right whales under the Endangered Species Act.
The environmental assessment does include a pre-construction sonar survey of the lease. Recent analysis has determined that such investigations may be responsible for the large number of whale deaths along the Atlantic coast. Therefore, BOEM and NOAA must carefully evaluate the potentially lethal impacts of lease surveys on whales before approving any survey.
End of executive summary. Now the bad news.
BOEM has planned to sell Gulf of Maine leases ahead of the election on October 29, 2024. They are trying to race against time as President Trump promises to eliminate offshore wind power if elected. Of course, they may also try to grant leases before the inauguration, since developments that are granted leases are harder to stop.
Note that at the end of the above executive summary, I discuss BOEM, including lease sonar surveys within the Environmental Assessment (EA). This was promised in the draft EA, but in the final EA just released, this assessment was completely abandoned to make way for quick sales. No doubt this is to avoid new findings from sonar surveys that could lead to mass die-offs of whales.
If Trump wins, I would like to see a letter of resignation from BOEM's independent transition team. BOEM's blatant disregard for the whale's death is despicable.
Report available at: http://www.cfact.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/Maines-massive-floating-wind-folly.pdf
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