119. How to Overcome Challenges to the U.S.’s Offshore Wind Energy Goals

Lofty goals have been established in the U.S. for the offshore wind industry. The U.S. Department of Energy, Department of the Interior, and Department of Commerce announced a national goal in March 2021 to deploy 30 GW of offshore wind capacity by 2030. That would mark a significant increase from the 42 MW of offshore wind energy currently operating in the states. Meanwhile, the California Energy Commission (CEC) adopted a report yesterday establishing offshore wind goals. It seeks to develop 2 GW to 5 GW of offshore wind by 2030, and 25 GW by 2045. California has no offshore wind installed today. Other states also have individual goals. The challenges to reaching these goals are many. “From my perspective, looking at where we are now, there are some significant challenges that the U.S. has to face,” Chris Cowland, vice president of Global Offshore Wind with Worley, said as a guest on The POWER Podcast. Cowland, who is based in the UK and has spent the last 22 years working in the offshore sector, said the timeline is a “huge challenge,” noting that adding 30 GW of capacity by 2030 will not be easy. “There’s going to be a lot of pressure on governments to look at different policies—how they can accelerate. There’s going to be pressure on fabrication yards and supply chains, the whole remit of how are we actually going to get things to market much, much quicker,” he said. “So, that’s going to be a significant challenge, particularly just taking, as it stands at the moment, about eight years to get from auction to first power.” The lack of local content poses an obstacle too. Cowland said local content is “absolutely fundamental.” Yet, even as he touted his support for developing local resource markets, Cowland said that local content could adversely affect costs, because developed regions such as the U.S. have difficulty competing against suppliers in Asia and other low-wage areas of the world. While shipping costs are lower for local suppliers, other costs can outweigh the benefits, resulting in competitive ad