Secretary of Energy Steven Chu and Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar stood together in Norfolk, Va., to announce a new project to speed up the development of offshore wind energy development in the United States.
The strategic plan between the two federal agencies commits up to $50.5 million in research and development funding over the next five years to projects that will support offshore wind power projects in high-priority wind energy areas in the mid-Atlantic.
The Department of Energy has a goal of deploying enough offshore wind farms to generate 54 gigawatts of electricity by 2030, at a cost of energy of 7 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh), with an interim target of 10 gigawatts of capacity deployed by 2020, at a cost of energy of 10 cents per kWh.
The Strategic Work Plan for the initiative includes three components: technology development ($25 million of the total budget); studying and removing "market barriers," including environmental risk reduction and supply chain development (up to $18 million during 2011~2013); and up to $7.5 million to develop and refine next-generation drivetrains, one of the major components of wind-turbine technology.
The British government gave approval to the area's largest offshore wind farm to date, which will include 77 turbines five miles off the Yorkshire coast, the BBC reports. Energy company E.ON, which will build and operate the turbines, says construction will begin within the next two years and be completed in an additional three to five years.
