Posts tagged "offshore"

Offshore Wind Power to Take Flight Off Atlantic Coast

On the heels of yesterday’s good news about progress for offshore wind energy in Massachusetts, today the Obama Administration announced a major new initiative to accelerate the development of clean, offshore wind power along the Atlantic Coast.

The Interior Department, (DOI), Governor O’Malley of Maryland and the President of the Offshore Wind Development Coalition, Jim Lanard, made this encouraging announcement for renewable energy in America today.

The primary announcement – over the next 60 days the administration will identify wind energy areas, (WEA), that are most promising for potential offshore wind development. They have been working with many eastern states, state-based task forces and stakeholders to determine these areas and identify what they believe will be the best places for siting this renewable energy source.

White House Lifts Ban On Offshore Drilling

The Obama administration announced this week that companies able to meet new safety standards will be allowed to drill in the Gulf of Mexico, ending a six-month moratorium that had been scheduled to end next month.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said the new rules imposed after the BP spill — the worst environmental disaster in the country’s history — have strengthened safety measures and reduced the risk of another catastrophic blowout.

“Operators who play by the rules and clear the higher bar can be allowed to resume” drilling, Salazar said at a Washington news conference. He added: “The oil and gas industry will be operating under tighter rules, stronger oversight, and in a regulatory environment that will remain dynamic as we continue to build on the reforms we have already implemented.”

Offshore Wind Can Deliver Cleaner, More Affordable Energy and More Jobs Than Offshore Oil

A report by Oceana “Wealth: Offshore Wind Can Deliver Cleaner, More Affordable Energy and More Jobs Than Offshore Oil”, a comprehensive analysis shows that focusing investments on clean energy like offshore wind would be cost effective, more beneficial to job creation, and better for the environment and ocean in a variety of ways than offshore oil and gas exploration and development.

On the Atlantic coast, an area targeted for expansion of oil and gas activities, offshore wind can generate nearly 30% more electricity than offshore oil and gas resources combined.

Report on Minerals Management Service’s Environmental Decisions Regarding Off-Shore Oil and Gas

On August 16, the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) issued a report (CEQ Report) summarizing the findings of a thirty-day review of the U.S. Department of Interior (DOI) Minerals Management Service’s (MMS)[1] environmental polices for oil and gas exploration and development in the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS). CEQ found that MMS’s reliance on the “tiering process” (where prior programmatic environmental reviews are incorporated into later site-specific analyses) was not transparent and led to confusion and concern regarding whether MMS sufficiently evaluated and disclosed environmental impacts.

France to Have 3,000 MW of Offshore Wind by 2015

According to Agence France Presse (AFP), the French government will launch next month a tender for contracts of 10 billion euros ($12.6 billion) to build 3,000 MW of offshore wind capacity. 600 wind turbines will be implemented within five to ten sites in Normandy, Brittany and the regions of Pays de la Loire and Languedoc. They are scheduled to start producing electricity by 2015.