The award of the lease to DONG Energy followed approval from the US Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) at its offshore wind auction held on 9th November 2015. The lease was originally secured by RES Americas Development Inc. and applies to an area off the coast of New Jersey that could potentially accommodate more than 1000 MW of offshore wind. However, RES Americas will continue to support the development of the lease area as agreed with DONG Energy.
The New Jersey lease is the second US lease area for the company, alongside an area along the coast of Massachusetts, the lease for which was secured by DONG Energy in June 2015. It has a total size of 160,480 acres and is located approximately ten nautical miles offshore. The average water depth is approximately 25 meters.
“The US is an interesting market for offshore wind with the potential to become a significant area for future development” said Samuel Leupold, Executive Vice President of Wind Power. “With the takeover of the offshore wind development projects in the US, we are broadening our international scope. The site conditions are quite similar to those we currently work with in North-Western Europe which means that the project could be developed using well-known technology.”
The New Jersey lease competitive lease auction was the US ninth competitive lease sale for renewable energy in federal waters for potential offshore wind energy development. The BOEM had previously awarded nine commercial offshore wind leases, including seven through the competitive lease sale process. Two of these were in an area off the shore of Rhode Island-Massachusetts. Another two were located off the shore of Massachusetts, two more off the coast of Maryland and one off the coast of Virginia.
The lease sales have generated around £14.5 million in winning bids for more than 700,000 acres in federal waters.
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