Ørsted Chosen for New Jersey Offshore Wind Project
The New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (NJBPU) has selected Ocean Wind, an offshore wind energy project proposed by Ørsted with support from Public Service Enterprise Group (PSEG), to negotiate a 20-year offshore wind farm with a capacity of 1.1GW.
Located off the coast of Atlantic City, Ocean Wind will be New Jersey’s first large-scale offshore wind farm. It will also be the first offshore wind farm in the U.S. to exceed 1GW. Subject to Ørsted’s final investment decision, the wind farm is expected to be completed by 2024.
Ørsted will work with PSEG's non-utility affiliates which will provide land for the project and energy management services. PSEG, which serves 2.2 million electricity customers in New Jersey, has an option to become an equity investor in the Ocean Wind project.
Ocean Wind will supply more than half a million New Jersey homes. The project is expected to create over 3,000 direct jobs annually through development and the three-year construction cycle. Ørsted is also proceeding with plans to establish an operations and maintenance base in Atlantic City that will provide jobs during the 25+ years lifespan of the project.
The state has set the goal of having 3.5 GW of offshore wind by 2030. Another solicitation will open in 2020 and a third in 2022.
The award means that Ørsted has secured a U.S. offshore wind build-out portfolio with a total capacity of approximately 2GW to be completed between 2022 to 2024. Ørsted aims to optimize operations across the portfolio as well as inside the clusters:
Mid-Atlantic cluster
• Ocean Wind (1,100MW) will deliver power to New Jersey. Expected commissioning by 2024.
• Skipjack (120MW) will deliver power to Maryland. Expected commissioning by 2022.
North-East cluster (owned 50-50 with Eversource)
• Revolution Wind (704MW) will deliver power to Rhode Island (400MW) and Connecticut (304MW). Expected commissioning by 2023.
• South Fork (130MW) will deliver power to Long Island, New York. Expected commissioning by 2022.
Grid Connection
Separately, the US Department of Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) has published the official notice for comment on Anbaric’s proposed New York and New Jersey OceanGrids, advancing the projects along in the federal approval process. Anbaric is the first to present a planned transmission system for both New York and New Jersey and to advance its application to use federal waters for underwater cables to connect New York and New Jersey offshore wind to shore. OceanGrids will connect the offshore wind energy sought by New York and New Jersey to on-shore grids via offshore collector platforms and cables buried underwater and underground.