Partners broke ground on Vineyard Wind 1, America’s first commercial scale offshore wind farm which is a joint venture between Avangrid Renewables and Copenhagen Infrastructure. The 800MW project is located 24 kilometres off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard.
Construction of America’s first commercial offshore windfarm begins. Credit: Vineyard Wind website
Partners broke ground on Vineyard Wind 1, America’s first commercial scale offshore wind farm which is a joint venture between Avangrid Renewables and Copenhagen Infrastructure. The 800MW project is located 24 kilometres off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard. It is expected to generate electricity for more than 4,00,000 homes and businesses in Massachusetts, create 3,600 jobs, save customers €1.24 billion over the first 20 years of operation, and is expected to reduce carbon emissions by more than 1.6 million metric tonnes per year, the equivalent of taking 3,25,000 cars off the road annually.
A ceremony to commemorate the event was held at Covell’s Beach in Barnstable, the site where two cables will make landfall and connect to the grid at a substation further inland on Cape Cod.
Ignacio Galán, Chairman and CEO of Iberdrola and Chairman of AVANGRID, said: “Vineyard Wind is on a par with the most ambitious offshore developments globally, including those developed by the Iberdrola Group. With 15 years of offshore wind leadership, Iberdrola and Avangrid are more than ready to help the US benefit from the substantial opportunities of offshore wind including economic investment and job creation.”
Christian T. Skakkebæk, Senior Partner & Co-founder of CIP, said: “The US offshore wind industry holds tremendous promise for both job creation and reducing carbon pollution, and today’s ground breaking, while historic, is just the first of many steps the industry will take as it grows.”
Secretary of the Interior, Deb Haaland from the American government said: “The Interior Department is committed to responsibly accelerating our nation’s transition to a clean energy future, and doing so in coordination with our partners, stakeholders, Tribes and ocean users to avoid and reduce potential impacts as much as we can.”
Under the Project Labor Agreement (PLA) with the Southeast Massachusetts Building Trades, the work being done on site is using local union labor. The PLA ensures that at least 500 of the jobs created during the construction phase of the project will be filled by local tradespeople and includes aggressive hiring targets for women and black, indigenous and people of color (BIPOC).
The project will utilize 62 13MW General Electric Haliade-X wind turbines that will be connected to an offshore substation, where the power will be transferred to two export cables that will make landfall at Covell’s beach and connect to the grid at an inland substation. As a result of the cable laying, the Town of Barnstable and Vineyard Wind are collaborating on a long-awaited sewer improvement project, saving the town millions of dollars.
Vineyard Wind 1 will begin delivering clean energy to Massachusetts in 2023.
More about offshore power transmission here: 2nd HVDC & Offshore Power Transmission 2022
