Tuesday, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management gave its approval to US Wind’s plan to build and run Maryland’s first offshore wind farm.
The state has big goals for offshore wind and has had failed deals with the Danish green energy giant Orsted in the past.
“After more than four years of rigorous and robust analysis, we are thrilled to have secured this final BOEM approval,” said US Wind CEO Jeff Grybowski. “US Wind’s projects will produce massive amounts of homegrown energy and will help satisfy the region’s critical need for more electricity, all while supporting good local jobs.”
There are three parts to the Maryland Offshore Wind Project. Two of them have names: MarWin and Momentum Wind. The state of Maryland has given these two projects offshore green energy certificates.
But US Wind’s plan “considers” a third phase: building out the rest of its federal lease area. This would double the amount of power that the first two stages could produce.
US Wind says that MarWin will have no more than 22 turbines and Momentum Wind will have no more than 55. The first one should make around 300 megawatts of energy and the second one about 800, for a total of 1,100 MW, or 1.1 gigawatts. US Wind says that’s enough to power about 342,000 houses.
But the bureau gave the go-ahead for up to 114 offshore turbines to be put in place, which could add 2.2 GWs to the power grid.
“The project has the potential to generate up to 2,200 megawatts of clean, renewable energy for the Delmarva Peninsula and power over 718,000 homes,” in addition to “supporting almost 2,680 jobs annually over seven years,” according to BOEM Director Elizabeth Klein.
Maryland Gov. Wes Moore signed the Promoting Offshore Wind Energy Resources Act into law in 2023. This law set a goal for Maryland to get 8.5 GWs of power from offshore wind by 2031. “More than 15 gigawatts of clean energy from 10 offshore wind projects” have been approved by the Biden government so far.
The country will be more than halfway to the government’s goal of getting 30 GWs of power from offshore wind by 2030 if the projects go as planned.
