New Jersey hits pause on an offshore wind farm that can't find turbine blades

New Jersey hit the pause button Wednesday on an offshore wind energy project that is having a hard time finding someone to manufacture blades for its turbines.

The New Jersey Board of Public Utilities granted Leading Light Wind a pause on its project through Dec. 20 while its developers seek a source for the crucial components.

The project, from Chicago-based Invenergy and New York-based energyRE, would be built 40 miles (65 kilometers) off Long Beach Island and would consist of up to 100 turbines, enough to power 1 million homes.

Leading Light was one of two projects that the state utilities board chose in January. But just three weeks after that approval, one of three major turbine manufacturers, GE Vernova, said it would not announce the kind of turbine Invenergy planned to use in the Leading Light Project, according to the filing with the utilities board.

A turbine made by manufacturer Vestas was deemed unsuitable for the project, and the lone remaining manufacturer, Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy, told Invenergy in June that it was substantially increasing the cost of its turbine offering, Invenergy said.

That left the project without a turbine supplier.

“The stay enables continued discussions with the BPU and supply chain partners regarding the industry-wide market shifts,” Invenergy said in a statement. “We will continue to advance project development activities during this time.”

Christine Guhl-Sadovy, president of the utilities board, said the delay will help the project move forward.

“We are committed in New Jersey to our offshore wind goals,” she said. “This action will allow Invenergy to find a suitable wind turbine supplier. We look forward to delivering on the project that will help grow our clean energy workforce and contribute to clean energy generation for the state.”

The delay was the latest setback for offshore wind in New Jersey. The industry is advancing in fits and starts along the U.S. East Coast.

Nearly a year ago, Danish wind energy giant Orsted scrapped two offshore wind farms planned off New Jersey’s coast, saying they were no longer financially feasible.

Atlantic Shores, another project with preliminary approval in New Jersey, is seeking to rebid the financial terms of its project.

Opponents of offshore wind have seized on the disintegration of a turbine blade off Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts in July that sent crumbled pieces washing ashore on the popular island vacation destination.

But wind projects in other states, including Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Virginia, are either operational or nearing that status.

New Jersey has become the epicenter of resident and political opposition to offshore wind, with numerous community groups and elected officials — most of them Republicans — saying the industry is harmful to the environment and inherently unprofitable.

Supporters, many of them Democrats, say that offshore wind is crucial to move the planet away from the burning of fossil fuels and the changing climate that results from it.

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