megawatts

Sunrise Wind construction begins

August 9, 2024 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

In mid-July, construction started on New York’s largest offshore wind project. Sunrise Wind is a 924-megawatt offshore wind farm located about 30 miles off the coast of Montauk Point on Long Island. Sunrise Wind is expected to be operating in 2026 and will provide enough clean energy to power nearly 600,000 homes, making it the largest offshore wind farm in the United States.

The ongoing construction project will support more than 800 direct jobs. It will be built under project labor agreements ensuring local union labor’s participation in all phases of construction.

Power from the wind farm will flow through an undersea cable coming ashore deep under the beach at Smith Point County Park. From there, the power will travel primarily under roadways via a transmission line terminating at a power converter station in Holbrook, Suffolk County.

Sunrise Wind is being developed by Oersted, the largest energy company in Denmark and the world’s largest developer of offshore wind power by number of built offshore wind farms.

The second large offshore wind farm in New York, Empire Wind I, is being developed by Equinor. These large wind farms are the result of New York’s fourth offshore wind solicitation. The two projects, totaling over 1,700 megawatts, will be the largest power generation projects in New York State in more than 35 years once they enter operation in 2026.

New York has also launched a fifth offshore wind solicitation for which final proposals will be due in September. Offshore wind is a major component of New York’s effort to expand the use of clean energy, grow its green economy, and combat climate change.

**********

Web Links

Construction begins on Sunrise Wind, New York’s largest offshore wind project

Photo, posted June 14, 2022, courtesy of Stephen Boutwell/BOEM via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Vineyard Wind Prepares For Construction | Earth Wise

November 5, 2021 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Vineyard Wind 1 will be the first utility-scale offshore wind energy project in the United States. It will be located 15 miles off the coast of Massachusetts and will consist of an array of 62 wind turbines, spaced one nautical mile apart. It will generate 800 megawatts of electricity, enough to power over 400,000 homes.

The project has recently closed on $2.3 billion of senior debt financing, which sets the stage for construction to begin. The joint venture between Avangrid Renewables and Copenhagen Infrastructure partners is one of the single largest investments in a renewable energy project in the U.S. The financial close is basically the final milestone for launching the project following years of clearing regulatory and other hurdles.

With the financial closing, Vineyard Wind will be instructing its contractors to begin work. Onshore work will start this fall and offshore work will begin in 2022.

The project will use Haliade-X wind turbine generators made by GE. These are some of the largest and most powerful wind turbines currently available, each one capable of generating 13 megawatts of electricity. The electricity generated by the turbines will be collected by an offshore substation and then transmitted to shore. Two submarine cables will bring the electricity from the substation to a landing point in Barnstable. The cables will be buried six feet below the seafloor. Underground cables will then route the power to an onshore substation in the village of Hyannis where it will be connected to the New England Grid.

Vineyard Wind is the first of many offshore wind farms in the works for the Northeastern United States.

**********

Web Links

U.S.’s first commercial-scale offshore wind project prepares for construction

Photo, posted March 24, 2016, courtesy of Andy Dingley via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.