The Department of the Interior in the US has gone on to announce a memorandum of understanding- MoU between the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management- BOEM as well as Maryland so as to support coordinated development in terms of wind energy generation offshore Maryland.
The announcement was made in the attendance of Maryland Governor, Wes Moore, Deb Haaland, the secretary of the interior, and Director of the BOEM, Elizabeth Klein, as well as Ali Zaidi, the White House National Climate Advisor.
As per Deb Haaland, Maryland is going to play a very significant role when it comes to helping in achieving the Biden-Harris administration’s renewable energy objectives of rolling out 30 GW of offshore wind energy capacity by 2030.
The announcement that has been made goes on to represent a major step towards a reliable, clean energy future that offers good paying jobs along with economic opportunities that are accessible across the communities of America.
As per Zaidi, thanks to President Biden’s vision as well as a strong partnership with the Maryland state along with federal leaders, the Biden-Harris administration is going to continue to work closely with the state so as to responsibly develop more areas pertaining to offshore wind leasing within the central Atlantic and also grow the sector.
The Biden-Harris administration will go on to use every tool that’s available so as to make sure that American workers as well as communities go on to reap the economic as well as environmental advantages of this growing sector across Maryland and also the country.
Under this MoU, the BOEM and also Maryland State will go ahead with the ongoing efforts so as to explore and identify the areas that have the potential for offshore wind leasing. The BOEM is also going to continue to go ahead with the Central Atlantic Intergovernmental Renewable Energy Task Force as well as other stakeholders so as to take care of the challenges that are associated with the citing pertaining to the offshore wind leasing areas.
Director Klein from BOEM says that they are proud of their commitment to developing a robust offshore wind sector that is advantageous to communities as well as co-exist with certain other ocean usage. This MoU makes the partnership more robust so as to partner on expanding opportunities for offshore wind energy across the Central Atlantic.
In December 2023, the Biden Administration, along with Defense and Commerce, the Departments of the Interior, the U.S. Coast Guard, and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, announced plans to work jointly so as to assess additional areas off the Maryland shores that can as well become wind energy areas and therefore support development in terms of offshore wind projects.
It is well to be noted that in May, the Maryland General Assembly inked legislation that’s aimed at keeping the offshore wind objectives of the state on track. This law also goes on to qualify offshore wind developers to go ahead and apply for OREC- Offshore Renewable Energy Credits, which have been created as a result of market changes, and also to add more capacity to the existing projects that are existing. The new law goes on to edit the POWER Act so as to add more solicitation to the Department of General Services schedule for offshore wind procurement. Notably, in 2023, Maryland went on to quadruple the offshore wind target to 8.5 GW from 2 GW as the state looked forward to attaining 100% clean energy by 2035.
