From: Eric | 7/7/2024 2:04:49 PM | | | | Green tick sought to double size of Australia’s biggest wind farm
Image: Acciona Energia Giles Parkinson
Jul 7, 2024 0
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Spanish energy giant Acciona Energia has filed for federal environmental approval for a proposed one gigawatt wind project that will effectively double the size of what will already be the country’s biggest wind farm.
The Herries Range wind project – first unveiled in late 2022 – will more than double the size of the 923 megawatt (MW) MacIntyre wind precinct near Millmeran in south-east Queensland, and is part of a wind precinct dubbed “Big Mac”.
The neighbouring 160-turbine MacIntyre wind farm is already nearing completion, and Acciona says Herries Range will see up to another 176 wind turbines, three substations and an unspecified battery storage facility.
The Herries Range project was originally costed at $2 billion when announced nearly two years ago, although costs may have increased since then since the Macintyre component also ran into cost issues.
Acciona says it hopes to start early works in 2025, followed by full construction through to approximately 2027. The wind farm will have an operational life of approximately 30 years.
The wind projects are located in south-east renewable energy zone in the southern downs region of Queensland, on the western slopes of the Great Dividing Range.
But they are also in the federal electorate of Maranoa, held by Nationals leader David Littleproud, who has said he wants to stop large scale wind and solar projects across Australia, and has threatened to tear up contracts written by the Commonwealth to support such developments.
In its application under the federal EPBC Act, Acciona says community support for the Macintyre component has grown significantly since construction began, with support for the project increasing from 49 per cent in Q3, 2023 to 58 per cent in Q1 2024.
It says opposition to the MacIntyre wind project (20 per cent of respondents) had decreased by one third over this period and was lower than community opposition to the renewable energy transition generally (40 per cent of respondents).
The project will be spread over around 22 freehold properties, about half of which is used for grazing and the other half featuring remnant and high value regrowth vegetation.
The MacIntyre wind component is 70 per cent owned by Acciona and 30 per cent by Ark Energy, the renewable energy offshoot of Korea Zinc. It was to include a 100 MW facility known as Karara that was to be owned by the state government owned CleanCo, but CleanCo backed out of the deal because of connection delays and rising costs.
The 923 MW MacIntyre facility will still be the biggest in Australia when complete, although it will lose that title when the 1,300 MW Golden Plains wind farm in Victoria completes its first and second stage. MacIntyre could then retake the title as the biggest wind precinct if the Herries Range component is built.
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From: Eric | 7/8/2024 9:11:26 PM | | | | First turbines go up at off-grid mine after 850kms journey from port
Rachel Williamson
Jul 8, 2024 1
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Two months after all of the parts arrived at the remote Western Australia Jundee gold mine, the crane to install them has caught up and the first turbine is being erected.
Renewables developer Zenith Energy says the Goldwind crane has arrived on-site and is now installing the first 165/6.0 megawatt (MW) wind turbine at the site.
The 86 metre-long blades were trucked in from Geraldton Port, via an 850km route that required fences to be taken down and an upgrade to the Wiluna town bypass.
The 24 MW wind farm complements a 16.9 MW solar farm using 5B solar farm blocks that began generating power last week.
The microgrid for the remote Northern Goldfields site is backed up by a 12 MW / 13.4 MWh battery, for which commissioning has started, to provide 56 per cent of the site’s power needs. The remainder will be looked after by the existing gas power station.
Combined, the wind and solar farms are expected to cut the mine’s greenhouse gas emissions by more than half.
The renewables project is underpinned by a power purchase agreement (PPA) between Zenith Energy and mine owner Northern Star Resources, which the miner says will help it “achieve and exceed” its target of a 20 per cent reduction in the carbon intensity of its business by 2025 from a 2020 baseline. A target which includes scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions.
Zenith ticks off Kathleen Valley microgrid Zenith Energy is also in charge of the Kathleen Valley lithium project in the Western Australia Goldfields area.
The renewables developer reached commercial operations for the 16MW solar, 17MW/19 MWh battery and 30 MW wind farm last week, a milestone it says marks the finish line for Australia’s largest islanded hybrid power station.
Mine owner Liontown Resources says powering construction and commissioning of the Kathleen mine with renewables might be a first for an Australian mining project, as others tend to ramp up their clean energy generators once production starts.
Liontown says the system is already powering the on-site accommodation and process plant, and will eventually also power the underground lithium mine, and it expects to beat its initial target of meeting 60 per cent of its supply needs for renewables.
Some 5MW of diesel standby and 27MW of gas generation were brought online earlier this year, but these will often be switched off and will operate only when the renewable resources are unavailable.
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From: Eric | 7/9/2024 9:44:34 PM | | | | A US firm is refurbishing, upgrading, and relocating older wind turbines for re-use in the distributed energy resources market, earning it a slot in the Re-X Before Recycling competition of the US Department of Energy. Wait, Don’t Recycle Those Old Wind Turbines… Re-Use Them!
5 hours ago
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End-of-life issues have begun to bedevil the US wind industry as thousands of old and out-of-date wind turbines head for the dustbin of history. Fortunately, help is on the way. Re-powering older wind farms with new equipment is one way to salvage at least some parts of an old wind turbine for re-use instead of dumping them in a landfill. Another approach involves leveraging the emerging distributed wind market to restore the whole turbine to life, from soup to nuts.
What’s So Big About The Distributed Wind Turbine Market?
While much attention has focused on the massive scale of new wind turbines and wind farms, another significant part of the renewable energy transition has been bubbling up from the US power generation landscape.
If you guessed distributed wind is in the mix, run right out and buy yourself a cigar. Distributed wind falls into the category of distributed energy resources, which refers to a focus on energy resilience and decentralization, rather than continuing to rely on the centralized power generation model of the past.
As described by the US Department of Energy, wind turbines of any size can fit the distributed energy resources model, so long as they generate electricity for use on site, or for contribution to a local distribution grid.
Expanding the foothold of small and mid-sized turbines in the distributed energy field has been a challenge, especially compared to the robust growth of the market for small rooftop and ground-mounted solar arrays. Nevertheless, the US Department of Energy has been supporting the effort.
Earlier this year, for example, the Energy Department launched a new program in collaboration with the Department of Agriculture, aimed at recruiting 400 farmers into the distributed wind fold.
“The new push for wind power builds on a US Department of Energy study that makes the case for pumping up the nation’s supply of distributed wind power, meaning hyper-local wind farms and individual wind turbines,” CleanTechnica reported in March.
Wind Turbines & The Circular Economy Of The Future
With that in mind, let’s take a look at the wind turbine refurbishing firm Rockwind. The company reached out to CleanTechnica this week with a reminder that the US Department of Energy tapped it for one of 20 awards in Phase I of the new “Re-X Before Recycling Prize” competition.
The Re-X program is aimed at drawing attention to the sustainability benefits of re-using various products and parts instead of grinding them up or melting them down in a recycling center.
“By stimulating innovation and private investment in circular economy approaches, the innovations developed through this prize will reduce life cycle energy and emissions, strengthen circular supply chains for emerging clean energy technologies, and decrease the demand for virgin materials,” the Energy Department notes.
The Energy Department further observes that processes and applications that center re-usability complement the broader aims of the Biden administration. “Innovations that enable new or expanded Re-X supply chains can also engage communities and labor, advance diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (DEIA), and support the implementation of the White House Justice40 Initiative,” they explain.
New Life For Old Wind Turbines
Rockwind focuses on mid-sized, standalone wind turbines ranging from 400 to 900 kilowatts. That’s peanuts compared to the multi-megawatt utility-scale wind turbines of today, but it’s a lot more than the small wind category, which includes micro wind turbines of 20 watts on up to small wind turbines in the 100-kilowatt category silo.
Apparently there are also enough mid-sized turbines in circulation to support Rockwind’s refurbish-and-reuse business model.
“Hundreds of wind turbines are being decommissioned to make way for even larger wind turbines, but those wind turbines can be cost effectively refurbished and reused in distributed energy applications,” Rockwind notes.
Re-Using Old Wind Turbines: The Devil Is In The Details
That sounds simple enough, but Rockwind emphasizes that quality control is imperative. A distributed wind installation typically involves just one or two turbines at a given site, often in remote locations. That translates into higher costs for servicing and maintenance. “Our goal, when selecting a decommissioned turbine, is to ensure we get the best value for our customers with a strong emphasis on minimal maintenance and a long operating life,” Rockwind explains.
When the company first launched, it imported decommissioned wind turbines from Europe to the US Midwest for a makeover. Ranging in size from 600 kilowatts to 1 megawatt, these turbines were selected based on their 40-year design lifespan, which Rockwind describes as “built to aerospace quality.” They were replaced with larger models after just 20-25 years in service, leaving a respectable amount of lifespan in a new location.
The company’s current plans include refurbishing decommissioned wind turbines from US wind farms as well. Either way, much of the refurbishing process involves replacing the older drivetrain with new parts that reflect modern materials and technology improvements.
“We pay for the highest quality parts that have been shown to last longer and perform better,” Rockwell emphasizes.
In addition to repainting the towers, the refurbishing work also includes rebuilding the blades with leading edge tape and stall strips. These extra touches improve the efficiency and lifespan of fiberglass blades beyond their performance when new, as described by Rockwind.
Many Paths To The Sustainable Wind Turbine Of The Future
Beyond the distributed wind field, the idea of remaking an older wind turbine into a more efficient power generating station has also taken hold among wind farm developers.
Some repowering projects involve re-using the wind turbine tower, but in others the entire turbine is replaced. A 2019 repowering project in Wyoming, for example, involved replacing 68 wind turbines from the 1990s with just 13 new, more powerful models. The result was a 60% increase in output along with lower maintenance costs.
Wind turbine technology improvements are also happening so fast that some wind farm developers are engaging in a sort of pre-repowering strategy. The high profile Vineyard Wind offshore wind project in Massachusetts, for example, was originally planned as an 84-turbine array. Before construction began, the developer switched to GE’s new Haliade-X offshore turbines, trimming the final number down to 62 turbines.
As for other sustainability improvements, the Energy Department is focusing attention on the more efficient use and longer lifespan of materials, in addition to innovations in turbine material recycling.
Wooden turbine towers and turbine blades are also among the new developments to hit the CleanTechnica radar.
In another interesting twist, the Swiss energy storage firm Energy Vault has introduced the idea of incorporating recycled turbine blades in its gravity-based energy storage system, with an assist from the US branch of the global firm Enel Green Power.
Earlier this year, Enel suggested that the idea has come to fruit. In a press release describing Energy Vault’s new 18-megawatt energy storage project in Texas, Enel noted that fiberglass from decommissioned wind turbines can be used to reinforce the moving weights deployed in the system.
I’ll check in on Enel to see if “can be” means “was actually,” so stay tuned for more on that.
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Image: A US firm is refurbishing, upgrading, and relocating older wind turbines for re-use in the distributed energy resources market, earning it a slot in the Re-X Before Recycling competition of the US Department of Energy (courtesy of US DOE).
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From: Eric | 7/15/2024 2:32:41 PM | | | | WestWind unveils plan for massive 1.5GW wind farm in Sunshine State
A mock-up of Cameron Downs Energy Park. Source: WestWind Energy Sophie Vorrath
Jul 15, 2024 7
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The originator of the largest onshore wind farm currently being developed in Australia, the 1.3GW Golden Plains project in Victoria, has unveiled plans to go bigger again and build a 1.5GW wind farm in northern Queensland.
WestWind Energy says it is preparing planning and environmental applications for the newly announced Cameron Downs Energy Park, proposed for development south of Hughenden in Queensland’s Flinders Shire.
The early stage planf or the project is to install up to 200 turbines, with a height of 280 metres from ground to tip, on a site area of around 32,000 hectares.
A project fact sheet says the “significant renewable energy project” would power around one million north Queensland homes and save more than 4 million tonnes of carbon dioxide a year.
“We are in the early stages of development for the Cameron Downs Energy Park preparing the required planning and environmental applications,” the fact sheet says.
“We’re engaging with local stakeholders to better inform the project development. These include Flinders Shire Council and cultural heritage experts.
“We’ll continue to work collaboratively with landholders, neighbours and other local stakeholders including the community… We’re also working with other developers in the region to maximise the renewable energy benefits possible and ensure quality community outcomes.”
According to the project website, a contribution of $2,000 per turbine would be put towards a local community benefits scheme that would be developed in consultation with the community, and the contributions provided each year to ensure the project’s financial benefits are shared across the region.
WestWind is also currently proposing to develop a 1.5 gigawatt (GW) wind farm in Lake Victoria in south west NSW, kicking off community consultation for that project in late March.
And it was the original developer of the Golden Plains wind farm in Victoria, where construction is underway of the final 577MW stage of the massive 1,333MW project.
The 756MW Golden Plains Wind Farm Stage 1, now owned by TagEnergy, is complete and expected to start producing green energy in the first quarter of 2025, with Stage 2 to follow in mid-2027.
Once complete, Golden Plains Wind Farm will be the biggest in Australia, delivering 9% of Victoria’s energy, or enough to power more than 750,000 homes – the equivalent of every home in regional Victoria.
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From: Eric | 7/20/2024 12:24:14 PM | | | | Green Energy Electrek Green Energy Brief EGEB Offshore wind power New York
New York’s largest offshore wind farm officially breaks ground
Michelle Lewis | Jul 19 2024 - 1:00 pm PT 11 Comments
Map: Orsted
Governor Kathy Hochul (D-NY) announced this week that Sunrise Wind, New York’s largest offshore wind farm, has kicked off construction.
Hochul said, “By breaking ground on Sunrise Wind and advancing the next wave of offshore wind projects, New York is passing a tremendous milestone to combat climate change.”
As Electrek reported on this post on June 24, the mature offshore wind project secured the final permit it needed from the US Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) to start construction.
Its permitted construction and operations plan outlines the offshore wind farm’s one nautical mile wind turbine spacing, the requirements for the construction methodology for all work in federal ocean waters, and mitigation measures to protect marine habitats and species.
The 924-megawatt (MW) Sunrise Wind will generate enough clean energy to power nearly 600,000 New York households. It’s around 30 miles east of Montauk Point, Long Island, and is expected to be operational in 2026.
The project was previously a 50-50 partnership between Ørsted and Eversource, but Ørsted finalized the acquisition of Eversource’s stake for $78 million last week.
Sunrise Wind’s team will now ramp up work on the onshore transmission system, and offshore construction will kick off later this year at the project site.
The offshore power export cable will come ashore at Smith Point County Park in Brookhaven, New York, and a new converter station and an expanded existing substation will be in Holbrook, New York.
New York’s largest offshore wind farm will create 800 direct New York jobs and thousands of indirect jobs. John R. Durso, president of the Long Island Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, said, “Hundreds of local trade union men and women will have good-paying jobs building Sunrise Wind onshore and offshore. Moving this project forward will help power our grid and our regional economy.”
Sunrise Wind has finalized its agreements with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) on a 25-year offshore wind renewable energy certificate (OREC) contract. It will help New York State achieve its 70% renewable electricity mandate by 2030.
The project previously canceled its contract, part of New York’s first offshore wind solicitation in 2019. Still, it reached viable power purchase agreements in February this year in the state’s fourth offshore wind solicitation.
Read more: A major US offshore wind hub just broke ground in New York City
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From: Eric | 7/22/2024 12:52:24 PM | | | | New Zealand’s second largest wind farm is fully operational
Image Credit: Meridian Energy Joshua S Hill
Jul 22, 2024 0
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New Zealand electricity company Meridian Energy says the country’s second biggest wind farm, the 176 megawatt (MW) Harapaki facility on the country’s North Island, has begun full operations.
The Harapaki wind farm was delivered within a month of its originally scheduled completion date and inside the $NZ448 million capital forecast. It consists of 41 SWT-DD-120 turbines from Siemens Gamesa.
Capable of generating enough electricity to power the equivalent of 70,000 homes – the equivalent of most of nearby Hawke’s Bay – the Harapaki is located north of Napier in the Maungaharuru Range.
“We’re now right in the middle of winter and every bit of generation helps,” said Guy Waipara, Meridian’s general manager for development.
“Harapaki has been generating since last November and was around 90% capacity at 30 June, but reaching full capacity means this wind farm is doing everything it can to help maintain security of supply.”
Wind energy currently accounts for only 6 per cent of New Zealand’s electricity generation, according to the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority (EECA).
And though this is anticipated to increase over the next few years – with several wind farms under construction or in various stages of development – current wind energy capacity sits at just over 1GW. The biggest wind farm is the 220 MW Turitea project near Palmerston North.
New Zealand has plans to build out its wind energy capacity to generate 20 per cent of the country’s electricity by 2030, and potentially as much as 34 per cent by 2035.
The country is also exploring the potential development of offshore wind farms, with the government announcing in 2022 the development of regulatory settings to enable investment in offshore renewable energy.
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From: Eric | 7/27/2024 8:36:55 PM | | | |
Wind Energy & Infrasound — More FUD Debunked, or “Why Is My Sheep Dog Ignoring Me?”
7 hours ago
David Waterworth 6 Comments Sign up for daily news updates from CleanTechnica on email. Or follow us on Google News!
In a testament to the longevity of FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt) and the ability of the internet to encourage stupidity, a legal action against the building of the Tilt Renewables Palmer Wind Farm in South Australia has gone all the way to the South Australian Supreme Court and lost. It was claimed that infrasound from wind turbines made the locals sick. A quick search of CleanTechnica reveals that this issue was dealt with ten years ago. Here we go again.
Although claiming that infrasound produced by wind turbines would make people unwell — subjective non-specific symptoms included annoyance, sleep disturbance, headaches, and nausea — no medical evidence was presented to the court. The argument was also tendered that infrasound would confuse the sheep dogs working on the farming properties. Anyone heard of confused sheep dogs herding sheep around and around a wind turbine? And perhaps tripping over the piles of dead birds killed by said turbines? Now, that would make a great Facebook post. Dog whistling taken to an extreme. FUDster heaven! Waterfalls and waves also produce infrasound, but no one is complaining about them. Their sound is deemed relaxing!
 Mandy my sheepdog. Photo courtesy Majella Waterworth.
The Tilt Renewables Palmer Wind Farm will now go ahead, and is expected to start construction in 2025 after fighting for 12 years with an absentee landlord who spearheaded the local opposition. Over those years, much has improved in the engineering of wind turbines. Tilt Renewables will produce almost as much power (288 MW) with the 40 turbines in the updated proposal that it would have done with the original 103 proposed. Construction is expected to be completed in 2028.
Tilt Renewables describes itself as a “leading renewable energy business and the largest owner of wind and solar generation in Australia. We tilt with the wind, and towards the sun to rebalance the electricity generation mix towards a lower carbon outcome. We tilt for good. We tilt for the future.” According to its website, Tilt Renewables has solar and wind farms already generating up to 1300 MW of power, with projects with a generating capacity of 500 MW under construction and projects with 3500 MW capacity in development.
 Photo by Zach Shahan | CleanTechnica.
As originally proposed: “The Palmer Wind Farm would produce enough clean energy to power about 144,000 homes. Every year it will avoid 305,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions, the same as taking 144,000 cars off the road. The Palmer Wind Farm would create approximately 250 jobs during construction. This is in addition to the flow on jobs that would be created by regional procurement.”
The knowledge around infrasound has also changed since the Tilt project was proposed. A 2001 literature search found: “Among the more consistent findings in humans were changes in blood pressure, respiratory rate, and balance. These effects occurred after exposures to infrasound at levels generally above 110 dB. Physical damage to the ear or some loss of hearing has been found in humans and/or animals at levels above 140 dB.” This has now been debunked.
A 2006 UK study into noise complaints about 3 wind farms found that infrasound could be measured on some occasions, but the noise level was below the threshold of human hearing. “This study also noted that at all the measurement sites the low frequency sound from the traffic on local roads was greater than that from the wind farms. This study made an important finding that the common cause of complaint regarding sound from wind farms was not associated with low frequency noise, but the occasional audible modulation of aerodynamic noise, especially at night.”
A paper presented at the 159th Meeting of the Acoustical Society of America outlines the results of sound measurements from Siemens SWT-2.3 MW-93 turbines: “… at more than 1000 feet (305 metres) the turbine model does not pose a low frequency noise or infrasound problem as it meets standards published by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI)… ‘Low frequency sound’ is the term used to describe sound energy in the region below about 200Hz. The rumble of thunder and the throb of a diesel engine are both examples of sounds with most of their energy in this low frequency range. Infrasound describes sound energy below 20Hz.”
Yet no one is calling for the ban of diesel motors? In fact, I would expect that most of the properties in the affected area of the Palmer Wind Farm would have diesel backup generators to run their equipment.
There was some genuine concern about low frequency noise from wind turbines due to the early turbine designs, “where the blades were down wind of (or behind) the turbine tower. This design caused a strong low frequency pulse, which also had significant levels of energy in the infrasound range, when the blades passed behind the tower.” So, there may be a grain of truth behind the FUD — but, like most FUD, now totally debunked and out of date.
“Most modern wind turbines are designed with the blades upwind of the tower, and have an increased distance between blades and the tower to minimise any residual possibility that the blades may interact with disturbed airflow upwind of the tower. These design developments have dramatically reduced the intensity of low frequency sound created by wind turbines.”
Australia needs wind power, especially in the evening peak time, to remove expensive gas peakers from the grid. At the moment, on a sunny morning in Brisbane, the east coast grid is 38% renewable, with South Australia and Queensland the only two states using a combined 475 MW of gas-fired electricity. Over 2 GW (out of a total of 30 GW) of electricity is being generated by wind and fed into the east coast grid. Today, most of the energy generation is coming from black and brown coal. Large and small solar is contributing almost 7 GW. Wind power averages out at one third of the cost of gas, and over the past twelve months has provided over 12% of Australia’s electricity generation. Thanks to John Baldwin for this link with the stats.
Tilt Renewables thanked the court, the local supporters, and stakeholders for their patience. Now let the work begin as we tilt towards a brighter and cheaper electrical future for Australia powered by renewable wind and solar.
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From: Eric | 7/29/2024 7:53:13 PM | | | | A 2.2 GW Maryland offshore wind farm just took a big leap forward
Michelle Lewis | Jul 29 2024 - 12:36 pm PT 1 Comment Photo Collections on Pexels.com
US Wind, a proposed 2.2 gigawatt (GW) Maryland offshore wind farm, just took a major step toward securing all of its federal permits by the end of 2024.
The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) today released US Wind’s Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS), clearing another hurdle for the project’s developers, Italy’s renewable energy developer Renexia, to build up to 114 turbines totaling 2,200 megawatts (MW) capacity, enough to power 770,000 homes with clean energy.
Jeff Grybowski, US Wind’s CEO, said in an emailed statement, “We are now one step closer to securing all of our federal permits by the end of this year, and look forward to the day we can get steel in the water.”
US Wind’s lease area is approximately 10 miles off the Maryland coast and approximately 10.4 miles off Sussex County, Delaware, at its closest points to shore. The project includes three planned phases and two of those phases, MarWin and Momentum Wind, have received offshore renewable energy certificates from the State of Maryland.
US Wind’s proposal also includes up to four offshore substation platforms, one meteorological tower, and up to four corridors for offshore export cables that would make landfall in Delaware Seashore State Park.
The development and construction phases of the project could potentially support an estimated 2,679 jobs annually over seven years.
US Wind has been awarded offtake agreements with the state of Maryland and will re-engage the state’s public utility board to restructure those agreements in the fall.
As part of the project, US Wind advanced plans to build Sparrows Point Steel, an offshore wind turbine foundation facility in Baltimore Harbor, which, when fully operational, would employ more than 500 people, including hundreds of unionized steelworkers.
Liz Burdock, president and CEO at Oceantic Network, said in an emailed statement:
Along with US Wind’s direct investment in Sparrows Point Steel, this offshore wind project will contribute to new, well-paying jobs across Maryland and throughout the supply chain.
While more projects are needed to meet Maryland’s offshore wind energy targets, today’s action is an important step forward to deliberately advance another commercial scale offshore wind project.
Once US Wind receives final approval to begin construction, the pipeline of approved projects during the Biden administration will exceed 15 GW. Currently, more than 5 GW of projects are under installation, and 300+ MW are online.
Read more: The world’s largest steel mill will get a second life as a wind turbine factory
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From: Eric | 8/7/2024 1:45:31 PM | | | | First stage of what will be Australia’s biggest wind project gets ready to inject power into grid
Giles Parkinson
Aug 7, 2024 2
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The first stage of the Golden Plains wind project in Victoria, which will be the biggest in Australia when complete, has entered the market operator’s grid management system and will soon be ready for testing and commissioning.
Golden Plains is divided into two stages, east and west, and will total 1,333 megawatts (MW) when both stages are finished in 2027, overtaking the 923 megawatt (MQW) MacIntyre wind project in Queensland.
But Golden Plains may also be first to market, with its first 756 MW stage already entering the grid management system, according to Geoff Eldridge of GPE NEMLog, which enables it to begin testing and start to work through the commissioning process, which could take another five to six months.
The $3 billion project, which will also include a big battery – possibly sized at 300 MW and several hours of storage – began construction in 2023, and obtained its connection approvals from the Australian Energy Market Operator in just five months, around half the time normally expected.
Golden Plains is the third new wind project in Victoria to enter the grid management system in recent weeks.
Just last week, the 218 MW Ryan’s Corner wind project owned by Global Power Generation near Port Fairy officially entered the AEMO Market Management System (EMMS) and the nearby 89 MW Hawkesdale wind farm entered the MMS in late May.
The Hawkesdale wind project is now on a 30 MW hold point as it works its way through the commissioning process towards full capacity.
At Golden Plains, more than one quarter of the 122 turbines in the first stage of the project have already been erected, and construction of the 93-turbine second stage began in June after a financing deal was landed with Australia and overseas banks.
Construction on the first stage of Golden Plains started in early 2023. MacIntyre started construction in 2022 and was going to be sized at more than a gigawatt, but one 103 MW component was withdrawn by the state-owned CleanCo last year because of connection delays and rising costs.
It is yet to enter AEMO’s grid management system, GPE NEMLog’s Eldridge says.
However, MacIntyre will have the opportunity to double in size with the 1,000 MW Herries wind component, part of the broader MacIntyre precinct, also now working its way through the planning process.
Golden Plains is using V162-6.2MW wind turbines from Danish turbine maker Vestas. It is majority owned by TagEnergy.
It has signed power purchase agreements with Equinox, Snowy Hydro and Ikea and hopes to also secure an underwriting agreement through the federal government’s Capacity Invesgment Scheme.
It has also partnered with retailer Energy Locals to provide eligible residents within a 3km radius of the turbines with up to $1600 per annum in credits, equivalent to the annual usage of an average Victorian home, by switching to Energy Locals.
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From: Eric | 8/7/2024 1:54:16 PM | | | | Heavy seas engulf the Block Island Wind Farm — the first US offshore wind farm. The five Halide 6MW turbines were installed by Deepwater Wind and began producing power in 2016. (Photo by Dennis Schroeder / NREL)
New England’s Offshore Wind Resource Is A Winter Powerhouse 20 hours ago
Guest Contributor 11 Comments Sign up for daily news updates from CleanTechnica on email. Or follow us on Google News!
It was a bitter cold day on January 5, 2018, and Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker had no choice. An Arctic air mass had descended on New England, causing temperatures in Boston to remain below 20 degrees Fahrenheit for a week. Outside, the windchill was negative 15 degrees, and the regional grid operator was warning that the situation was dire. Demand for electricity was high, but there was not enough gas available to keep all the gas-fired power plants running. Meanwhile, the power plants that burned oil had only a few days’ worth of fuel left in their tanks.
To make matters worse, the oil truck drivers, who had been working overtime to make deliveries to power plants as well as homes and businesses, had now reached state-mandated shift limits. They could not legally deliver the extra fuel that the oil plants needed to keep running. If the oil plants could not run, the supply of power on the grid would not be able to keep up with the demand for power, which would create an “energy shortfall” that could force the grid operator to ration the remaining supply through rotating outages. This would leave people without power in the frigid temperatures.
Confronted with this problem, Governor Baker did what was necessary to protect public safety. On the afternoon of Friday, January 5, 2018, he signed a “Declaration of Emergency” to waive the driving-time limits and allow the critical fuel deliveries to the oil plants to proceed.
Meanwhile, less than 100 miles away from the governor’s office as the gull flies, a strong wind was blowing over the ocean south of Martha’s Vineyard. Wind speed data subsequently showed that if just two 800 megawatt offshore wind projects had been operating, they would have provided 435,237 megawatt-hours of electricity—enough to have met 7% of all electricity demand in New England over the entire 16-day cold spell. (1 megawatt-hour is 1,000 kilowatt-hours.) The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) has calculated that an 8,000 megawatt offshore wind fleet would have provided 175,000 megawatt-hours of electricity on January 5th alone, enough to have met 42% of the demand for power in all of New England on that day.
In other words, if an offshore wind fleet had been operating, there would have been no crisis, and no need for emergency action by the governor.
A grid problem on land, a grid solution at sea
The situation in January 2018 was extreme, but it was not unique. The New England power grid has experienced close calls during extreme cold weather on multiple occasions over the past two decades, and historical weather data shows that in almost every instance, strong winds were blowing off the coast at the same time. This is not a coincidence but a straightforward matter of meteorology; in most cold snaps, the same cold-weather systems that strain our grid have simultaneously been delivering massive amounts of offshore wind energy to the region.
To put it more simply: in New England, low temperatures and strong winds tend to travel together.
This well-timed supply of energy off our coast offers an elegant solution to what until now has been an intractable problem for the regional electric grid operator ISO New England (ISO-NE): how to maintain reliability during a prolonged cold spell when demand for power is high but the region’s limited supplies of gas and oil are running low. (Coal, which has played only a small role in our energy mix in recent years, will cease to be a factor in 2028, when the region’s last coal-fired power plant will shut down due to coal’s poor economics.)
Is there enough offshore wind to make a difference?
To better understand the contribution that offshore wind could make to the winter reliability of the power grid, a new UCS study examined two sets of historical data from ISO-NE’s Variable Energy Resource time series over 22 past winter seasons (2000-2022). One data set provides a detailed record of load levels (electricity demand) during each season, and the other provides a matching record of the electricity supply from offshore wind (derived from historical offshore wind speeds). This allowed us to simulate how a hypothetical offshore wind fleet would have helped to meet demand on any given day of each past winter season.
In the first step of the analysis, we used the historical load data to determine the total daily energy demand on each day of each winter season, and then compared those values to the thresholds that ISO-NE uses to measure the degree of risk of an energy shortfall, or blackout. Demand levels above 350,000 megawatt-hours, for example, put the region at an elevated risk, while levels above 400,000 megawatt-hours indicate a higher risk, and levels above 450,000 megawatt-hours indicate the highest risk. In the graph below, representing the winter of 2017-2018, we have a clear view of the way that daily energy demand levels rose dramatically during the cold snap that began in late December, putting the region into the higher (orange) risk zone for almost two weeks:

Next, we used the historical offshore wind data to model the daily energy supply that would have been delivered by offshore wind fleets of different sizes: 1,500 megawatts (roughly equivalent to the combined capacity of the two projects under construction, Vineyard Wind and Revolution Wind), 4,000 megwatts (representing an additional 25,00 megawatts, or 2-3 more projects), and 8,000 megawatts (a fleet size that would be approached if all bids in the current tri-state solicitation were accepted). We then subtracted the offshore wind energy supply from the historical (actual) demand levels to arrive at net demand, to see the daily energy demand levels that would have remained and whether the energy shortfall risk was reduced.
As shown in the graph below, offshore wind energy supply would have made a dramatic difference. The output of even a small 1,500 megawatt fleet would have been enough to bring the region out of the higher (orange) risk zone on all but two days of the cold snap, while an 8,000 megawatt fleet would have entirely eliminated the demand driven risk:

While offshore wind is variable, the analysis showed that, from year to year, offshore wind projects would consistently have delivered enough power over the course of each winter season to greatly lower the number of days with an elevated risk of an energy shortfall. When we look at this impact over the entire 22-year period, we can see a clear progression in the amount of risk removed with each expansion of the offshore wind fleet:

A significant, and unexpected, finding of our analysis was that an 8,000 megawatt offshore wind fleet would have virtually eliminated the demand-driven risk of a winter blackout over the 22-year period, reducing the average number of days with elevated risk from 60 days per winter to just 2. This suggests that “going big” on offshore wind procurements, which would enlarge the fleet close to that size, could provide the same level of winter reliability protection that we have been achieving through much more difficult—and expensive—means.
New Englanders pay exorbitant prices to maintain winter reliability
Up until now, ISO-NE has not had the option of looking to offshore wind as a way to protect winter reliability. Instead, it has focused on increasing the supply of fossil fuels during extreme cold weather. But those efforts have encountered the same constraints that caused the problem in the first place; because New England has no fossil fuel supplies of its own, 100% of oil and gas supply must be imported. Imports depend on expensive infrastructure and transportation systems that indirectly raise the initial price of the fuel. During cold spells—the same time periods for which ISO is looking to secure new supply—temporary spikes in heating demand drive prevailing prices even higher.
Complicating matters further, shipments of liquified natural gas (LNG) into the region must be purchased in global markets, where fuel prices can be impacted by events in other parts of the world. Meanwhile, the limited run-time of the oil fleet makes its owners reluctant to stockpile too much oil, leading the ISO to conclude that adequate inventories will not be maintained without incentive payments. All of these factors have led to “astronomical” costs under ISO-NE’s most recent winter reliability programs, the Mysti c Cost of Service Agreement and the Inventoried Energy Program.
Offshore wind offers a way out of our costly winter reliability problems
The UCS analysis shows that adding offshore wind to the New England grid effectively adds an abundant supply of winter energy, which would be delivered seamlessly even on the coldest days of the year. The timing of that energy delivery, when the grid is strained by high demand and fuel supply challenges, makes it especially valuable as a way to maintain winter reliability. Moreover, the resource is big enough that it can provide winter reliability benefits on a scale that could allow us to stop subsidizing oil and gas just to keep the lights on in winter.
Offshore wind is an important resource all year round, for zero-carbon electricity, pollution reduction, job creation, and much more. But it’s in the winter that offshore wind will make its greatest contribution to the power system. Investing in a large offshore wind generation fleet now will secure all of these important benefits for New Englanders, while also allowing New England governors to welcome winter weather as an energy solution.
By Susan Muller, Senior Energy Analyst. Courtesy of Union of Concerned Scientists, The Equation.
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