August 3, 2023 — The first clean wind power generated by the Vineyard Wind 1 project is expected to flow onto the regional grid by mid-October and the first-in-the-nation offshore wind project should be fully operational by this time next year, project officials said Wednesday during a boat tour of the construction.
Project developers have maintained for years that the $4 billion project they are building about 15 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard would start to generate cleaner energy by the end of 2023, but they told a group of state lawmakers, clean energy advocates, organized labor representatives and others that the target is now mid-October, or just over two months from now.
At first, the project will send power generated by a string of six turbines onto the grid, totaling about 78 megawatts, with plans to ramp the project up to between 200 and 300 MW by the end of the year and full commercial operations of 806 MW expected by mid-2024, according to Sy Oytan, Avangrid’s chief operating officer for offshore wind.
Vineyard Wind, a joint venture between Avangrid and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, began offshore construction activities in June by setting the foundations for the 62 turbines that will make up the project that has been years in the making.
On Wednesday, about 15 representatives and two senators were among those who got to see the progress of that construction from aboard the Captain John and Son II, which was chartered for the tour by Avangrid, the Environmental League of Massachusetts and the New England for Offshore Wind Coalition.
When they are fully assembled, each of Vineyard Wind 1’s 62 turbines will stretch about 850 feet above the Atlantic Ocean — taller than any building in New England. There was not much to see in the way of towers or turbines Wednesday — those on the boat tour saw a series of foundations with “transition pieces” sticking up out of the water, each arranged one nautical mile away from others in a grid pattern.