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NEW BEDFORD — Vineyard Wind made mixed progress on its wind farm at the end of the year, meeting one deadline while missing another. It installed the last of 62 foundations for its wind turbines, a new map shows, pounding the remaining pieces into the seafloor before a New Year deadline, when pile driving is restricted through May. But the project missed its former goal of being fully operational by 2024, and has quite a bit of work ahead in 2025.
With the foundations finished, all but three are now connected to yellow transition pieces, which will allow tower installation to proceed, according to the Dec. 30 map. But the same map shows the project still has to install 30 towers and generators, and about 120 blades. That means dozens more barge transits in and out of the Port of New Bedford with the major turbine components on board.
The Light’s boat trip to the lease area on Nov. 20 showed that only a third of the turbines had been completed, while the other two-thirds needed work. About 30 towers were up, but about 10 lacked blades.
The estimate for towers and blades is more or less the same as of the end of December, when Vineyard Wind removed blades from a third turbine, AU39, according to archived maps. The Light previously reported blades had been removed from at least two other turbines and sent to Canada.
The latest map shows one set has been re-installed. The other turbine has a safety zone around it, which could suggest work is happening there to re-install blades.
In mid-2023, company executives projected the wind farm would be fully operational in 2024. Much of the delay comes from a blade failure in July, after which federal regulators paused project installation.
A safety zone remains around the tower, AW38, on which the blade failed in July. As of November, the nub of the broken blade remained attached to the turbine.
The Vineyard Wind project is still working under a partial suspension order from the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE). The latest order continues to prohibit power generation, but allows for blade installation on a case-by-case basis. BSEE did not immediately respond to questions Thursday.
Vineyard Wind also did not immediately respond to questions Thursday on the status and when it expects to complete the project. The wind farm’s first working turbines delivered electrical power to the Massachusetts grid between January and July 2024, until the blade failure and suspension order. With all 62 turbines running, it is supposed to provide enough electricity to power more than 400,000 homes.
Installation work typically slows in the winter, when seafaring conditions are not as amenable to turbine transport via the feeder barge system. Vineyard Wind extended its lease at the New Bedford staging terminal through March. There, rows of nacelles, towers and stacks of blades are awaiting delivery offshore for installation. The lease at the state-owned property was originally set to expire Dec. 31, 2024.
The company does not have to worry about getting squeezed out by another wind project come April, though. SouthCoast Wind’s lease on New Bedford’s waterfront isn’t set to begin until January 2029, and another Avangrid project is slated to stage components earlier, but out of Salem.
BSEE has been investigating the blade failure as project construction has resumed. Agency officials are set to answer pre-submitted questions from the public on the failure during a virtual meeting with the Nantucket Select Board on Jan. 14, in the final days of the offshore wind-friendly Biden administration.
President-elect Donald Trump may have a cooling effect on offshore wind development – having spread misinformation about it and threatening to end it on “day one.” Experts are uncertain about how much impact the second Trump administration could have on projects well underway, like Vineyard Wind, but they have speculated that projects less far along could face greater risk.
Meanwhile, offshore wind opposition group Nantucket Residents Against Turbines has appealed its lost case against the wind project in a petition to the U.S. Supreme Court, which the Biden administration argues should be rejected. The justices take up about 1% of the petitions they receive.
Email Anastasia E. Lennon at alennon@newbedfordlight.org.
Why is the farm prohibited from supply power from the functioning systems?
I just read an article that listed the potential cost savings of offshore wind as compared to natural gas used to generate electricity. It sounds great when the projection states $630 million dollars annually for the MA, RI, CT, but when you break it down per customer, that savings estimate is $2.79 to $5.00 per month, and that’s with Massachusetts paying the 4th highest electricity rates in America.
What a scam!!! It’s facts like these that tax payers, and rate payers should vote for, or against instead of allowing a liberal socialist Democrat Governor like Maura Healy, or a 70% majority of equally liberal socialist Democrats in MA legislators, I’m sure they’ll all get rich as a result of lying to the voters, as they always do, specially when you consider them spending over $1 Billion dollars in 2024 funding the needs of every illegal immigrant in the state!! I can’t wait for the mass deportations to begin on January 21, 2025.
T Ash asked why the working wind turbines are not allowed to produce electricity. As I understand the answer, officials are being extra cautious due to the broken blade situation. But I agree with T Ash’s idea that the working turbines ought to be able to generate electricity, so why not let them. The turbines are spaced far apart so working turbines should not interfere with repair work. We need clean wind power to fight global warming — the sooner the better.