During the first Floating Offshore Wind Shot Summit held virtually Feb. 22-23, U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm promoted the department’s program to create a new Floating Offshore Wind Shot.
Granholm joined leaders from the departments of Energy, Interior, Commerce and Transportation, plus governmental and community leaders, in discussing progress in floating offshore wind development in the U.S., a Feb. 24 news release said.
“We see floating offshore wind as one of the clean energy technologies with the most upside potential for deployment in the coming decades,” Granholm said in the release. “This Energy Earthshot is about so much more than just adding clean energy to the grid, this is about investing in American innovation and bringing supply chains home. It’s about creating jobs from sea to shining sea, and it’s about making America more energy secure and more energy independent.”
Granholm affirmed the goals to "drive U.S. leadership in floating offshore wind design, development and manufacturing," according to the release. The aim is reduce the costs of this technology more than 70% and deploy 15 gigawatts by 2035.
Additionally, the efforts to jump start West Coast offshore wind transmission planning, as well as research and partnerships was announced, the release reported.
U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland provided updates on floating offshore wind deployment, including work to bring offshore wind to Maine, Massachusetts and New Hampshire, the release said.
“By harnessing the power of offshore wind, the Biden-Harris administration is establishing the United States as a world leader in floating offshore wind,” Haaland said in the release. “Pursuing this exciting technology will provide communities with cleaner, cheaper and more reliable energy and create good-paying jobs all while having the least impact on the environment and ocean users.”
Ali Zaidi, assistant to President Joe Biden and White House national climate advisor, said Louisiana and California will join the Federal-State Offshore Wind Implementation Partnership, according to the release.
“President Biden is committed to seizing the massive economic opportunity embedded in taking on the climate crisis – and do so in a way that builds our economy from the bottom up and the middle out, creating good-paying union jobs,” Zaidi said in the release. “With floating offshore wind, we are positioning ourselves not to catch up, but to lead – to forge the frontier of a new technology that’s critical to our energy security.”
Retired Rear Adm. Ann Phillips, administrator of the Maritime Administration, said offshore wind vessels are known as Vessels of National Interest under the Federal Ship Financing Program (known as Title XI), the release said. More than $660 million in Port Infrastructure Development Program funding is available in 2023 for port projects supporting offshore wind.
“DOT and MARAD are thrilled to be supporting the President’s drive to grow our offshore wind industry by supporting construction of Jones Act-compliant vessels through Title XI, and the development of port infrastructure through PIDP,” Phillips said in the release. “We are also working to grow the mariner pool to attract the next generation the offshore wind industry’s well-paying, innovative and technically challenging jobs.”
AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler said floating offshore wind projects will “create quality union jobs,” according to the release
“Let’s take this potential and turn it into an American economy that leads the world,” Shuler said in the release. “Our unions are ready to do it, our workers are ready to do it, and I know this administration is ready to do it, too.”
Jason Ramos, elected member of California’s Blue Lake Rancheria’s Tribal business council, said the Tribe’s energy goal is “to be net-zero by 2030,” according to the release.
“We think it’s the right path culturally for respect of our ancestors and to the promise of future generations that we leave future generations not burdened with problems but rather with the hope of the prospects of a productive future,” Ramos said in the release. “A future that contains abundant low-carbon critical energy infrastructure and jobs and education in our disadvantaged communities. We look forward to the investment in human capital, education, job training in this floating offshore wind market.”
