Offshore wind gets a boost

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“We are opening our doors not just to oil and gas and coal, but also to the wise development of solar, wind and wave, biofuels, geothermal, and small hydro on America’s lands,” Department of the Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said as part of an OCS information gathering campaign currently going on across the country.  Mr. Salazar went on to describe the DOI, which manages one-fifth of the nation’s land mass and 1.7 billion acres of ocean off the U.S. coasts, as having a major role in creating the nation’s clean-energy future. “The Department’s Bureau of Land Management has identified about 20.6 million acres of public land with wind energy potential in the 11 western states and 29.5 million acres with solar energy potential in the six southwestern states.  There are also over 140 million acres of public land in the western states and Alaska with geothermal resource potential”.

Mr. Salazar’s visit to Atlantic City, NJ is part of a series of public meetings to gather information for building a comprehensive strategy for the outer continental shelf (OCS).  Drilling advocates see vast resources in natural gas and petroleum deposits; clean energy advocates see offshore wind and OTEC development opportunities.  What choice is better for America’s long-term energy conversion?  It seems, for the time being, one is going to get a boost.

Ken Salazar seeks to gather information regarding all development opportunities for the OCS including fossil fuels and clean energy.  Back on Feb. 10 Ken Salazar announced his department’s path forward toward solving our offshore energy resources dilemma.  It is a four-part strategy that culminates in a DOI rulemaking issuance.  Describing his own actions, Secretary Salazar said at the DOI:

• First, I am adding 180 days to the time period for public comment.
• Second, I am directing MMS and USGS to assemble a report, within 45 days from today, of all the information we have about our offshore resources.
• Third, in the thirty days that follow the report, I will hold four regional meetings around the country to gather the best ideas for how we move forward.
• Fourth, I am committed to issuing a final rulemaking on offshore renewable energy resources in the next few months.

Developing an OCS plan is one of Secretary Salazar’s top priorities.  Salazar stated that contained within the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which President Bush signed into law back then, were provisions that “required the Department of the Interior to move quickly (within nine months) and issue rules and regulations to guide the development of offshore energy resources like wind, wave, and tidal power.  Yet it took three years for the Bush Administration to prepare a proposed rule for offshore renewable energy development.  They left office without putting any final regulations in place because it was not their priority, notwithstanding the requirement of the law”.   

Secretary Salazar hosted the first of four regional meetings around the country in Atlantic City, and will issue his findings probably sometime in early summer.  At the meeting today, after presenting a brief overview of the Department's findings regarding OCS energy resources, the Secretary and his staff opened up the meeting to hear from public and private interests on the development of traditional and renewable sources of energy on the OCS. 

According to an executive summary of the OCS energy resources report, “around 20% of the Atlantic coastal states' electricity needs could be met through wind power; and the report highlighted environmental concerns of oil development”.  Secretary Salazar highlighted the potential of wind resources offshore saying, “ocean winds can generate 1 million megawatts of power, roughly the equivalent of 3,000 medium-sized coal-fired power plants”. 

“More than three-fourths of the nation’s electricity demand comes from coastal states and the wind potential off the coasts of the lower 48 states actually exceeds our entire U.S. electricity demand,” Mr. Salazar said.  “New Jersey is tripling the amount of wind power it plans to use by 2020 to 3,000 megawatts. That would be 13 percent of New Jersey's total energy, enough to power between 800,000 to just under 1 million homes,” the Associated Press reports.

After Atlantic City, the meeting schedule moves on to New Orleans at Tulane University on Wednesday, April 8.  Then on to Dena’ina Convention Center in Anchorage, Alaska, on Tuesday, April 14; and then the DOI OCS show will be at the University of California-San Francisco's Mission Bay Conference Center in San Francisco on Thursday, April 16.

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