The Department of the Interior (DOI), home to the National Parks Service, released a statement earlier this month that “the department’s renewable energy initiative has cleared an important environmental review, allowing Interior to move forward with the process for wind energy lease sales off Maryland, Virginia, New Jersey and Delaware.” The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) produced the review in conjunction with the DOI. The “National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) assessment found that there would be no significant environmental and socioeconomic impacts from issuing wind energy leases in designated Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) areas off the mid-Atlantic Coast.”
A proposed $5 billion “backbone” for transmission of offshore wind energy has been the works for a few years. In the press release, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar repeated President Obama’s call for an “all of the above” energy strategy, citing offshore wind as holding “‘incredible potential for our country, and we’re moving full-steam ahead to accelerate the siting, leasing and construction of new projects.’”
This project is not related to the on-again, off-again Cape Cod offshore wind farm that received the go ahead as the nation’s first such system.
[Image source: Ashley Dace]