USA: First Offshore Renewable Energy Bidding Starts This Week

The bidding for the two federal lease areas offshore Rhode Island and Massachusetts will start this week.

Nine companies, including Deepwater Wind, which is planning to develop a wind farm offshore Block Island, will bid for the 164,750 acres for commercial wind energy leasing.

The minimum bid for the south area, which covers an area of 67,252 acres, will be $1 per acre, or $67,252, and for the north, 97,498 acre- area, the minimum bid will be $2 per acre, or $194,996.

The lease areas will be auctioned simultaneously. Under the procedures, BOEM will consider nonmonetary (i.e., whether a bidder holds a Joint Development Agreement or a Power Purchase Agreement) and monetary (cash bid) factors. The nonmonetary phase of the auction will begin on July 29, 2013, and the monetary phase on July 31, 2013.

As previously reported, Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell said: “This is history in the making as we mark yet another major milestone in the President’s all-of-the-above energy strategy.”

“We are moving closer to tapping into the enormous potential offered by offshore wind to create jobs, increase our sustainability, and strengthen our nation’s competitiveness in this new energy frontier.”

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Offshore WIND staff, July 29, 2013; Image: boem