Three Teams Vie to Build 2 GW of Connecticut Offshore Wind

Three teams are competing to build 2,000 MW of Connecticut offshore wind infrastructure, responding to state outreach, but price and other key project details are unavailable on the heavily redacted public versions of submitted proposals.

Shell New Energies US and Portuguese partner EDP Renewables proposed two projects of 804 MW and 408 MW. The team claims to offer the lowest price ever for U.S. offshore wind power, but details were not revealed. It has partnered with offshore wind contractor DEME to give workers training at a European construction project site.

The team will use ports in Massachusetts to build and operate its smaller project at lower cost but it does not mention port investments for the larger project.

Developer Vineyard Wind aims to build four projects, from 400 MW to 1,200 MW, and spend “millions of dollars” on an offshore wind operations hub in Bridgeport. This includes redevelopment of an 18-acre waterfront industrial site with partner McAllister Towing and Transportation for steel fabrication and final outfitting of foundation components.

The proposal also includes $26.5 million for workforce development, a union labor pact and local business supply chain integration.

Wind farms would be located in one of two Vineyard Wind federal lease areas south of Nantucket also being developed for the firm’s Massachusetts project, which now is months delayed due to a new U.S. Interior Dept. order to study regional environmental impacts of the project, and others planned nearby, particularly on commercial fishing.

The third proposal, by Danish developer Orsted and Eversource Energy was nearly all redacted, with no project detail.

The firms said they are teamed with the Responsible Offshore Development Alliance, a commercial fishing lobby group, to explore approaches to project siting, design and operation. The group was highly critical of Vineyard Wind’s Massachusetts project.

In a public-private venture, the developers and state and local governments also will invest $93 million to upgrade the New London port as a staging hub.

Mary B. Powers has reported on engineering and construction issues in the global energy and environmental sectors for more than 30 years from Washington, D.C. and Birmingham, Ala. She formerly wrote for the Platt's group of energy sector publications under McGraw Hill and S&P Global that included Inside Energy and Megawatt Daily, and was state editor for the Lexington, Ky., Herald Leader. Mary has a master’s degree in journalism from The American University.

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