By Colin A. Young State House News Service
BOSTON — The project that has been eyed as the first utility-scale offshore wind development in the country was dealt a blow from the federal government Tuesday and Vineyard Wind no longer expects that its 800-megawatt project, chosen to deliver Massachusetts clean, renewable power, will become operational by 2022.
The Trump administration, which lawmakers and some in the energy world have accused of being prejudiced against wind developments, on Tuesday announced a new — and longer-than-anticipated — timeline for the ongoing federal review of the Vineyard Wind project and the offshore wind sector generally. The new timeline, the developer said, puts another planned milestone out of reach.
“We have received updated information from the Department of Interior that indicates the Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) for the Vineyard Wind I project will be published later than what was previously anticipated,” Vineyard Wind CEO Lars Pedersen said in a statement. “While we need to analyze what a longer permitting timeline will mean for beginning construction, commercial operation in 2022 is no longer expected. We look forward to the clarity that will come with a final EIS so that Vineyard Wind can deliver this project to Massachusetts and kick off the new US offshore energy industry.”
The Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) sent shockwaves through the industry in August with its plan to hold off on developing the final environmental impact statement for Vineyard Wind — the Massachusetts-contracted project that has been in line to be the first major offshore wind farm in the country — while it studies the wider impacts of a sector that is hoping to ramp up in Northeast and mid-Atlantic waters also used by the fishing sector.
On Tuesday, BOEM published a new “one federal decision permitting timeline,” which envisions the issuance of a decision for permit approval by Dec. 18, 2020. Before the feds launched the broad review of wind projects, a decision on permit approval had been expected by Aug. 16, 2019.
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Vineyard Wind had originally planned to financially close on its project and begin on-shore construction work in 2019, put the first turbine into the seabed in 2021 and have the 84-turbine wind farm generating electricity in 2022.
Officials from Vineyard Wind, a joint venture of Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners and Avangrid Renewables seeking to build an 84-turbine wind farm 15 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard, had said in July that the entire project would be at risk if the federal government did not issue the project’s final environmental impact statement by the end of August. Since then, the company affirmed its commitment to the project “albeit with a delayed project schedule.”
Vineyard Wind officials said Tuesday the company remains committed to being the first large-scale offshore wind project in the country and is in close contact with the utility companies it is under contract with about any impacts the federal review could have on the project.
The company has also been communicating with the U.S. Department of the Treasury to discuss the possibility of preserving eligibility for a key tax credit for Vineyard Wind and any other project that is similarly held up due to unforeseen regulatory actions.
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