September 19, 2023 — Governors of six Northeast states are asking the Biden administration to boost federal tax credits for offshore wind developers, give their states a share of revenue from offshore energy leases and hasten permitting for the projects.
In a Sept. 13 letter, the governors of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey and Maryland urgently called for more federal support for their states’ wind power agreements with developers. Echoing statements from Ørsted and other wind companies seeking to revise agreements, the governors wrote that “inflationary pressures, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and the lingering supply chain disruptions resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic have created extraordinary economic challenges that threaten to reverse these offshore wind gains.”
“Instead of continued price declines, offshore wind faces cost increases in orders of magnitude that threaten States’ ability to make purchasing decisions,” the letter states. “These pressures are affecting not only procurements of new offshore wind but, critically, previously procured projects already in the pipeline.
“Absent intervention, these near-term projects are increasingly at risk of failing. Without federal action, offshore wind deployment in the U.S. is at serious risk of stalling because States’ ratepayers may be unable to absorb these significant new costs alone.”