Nation’s largest offshore wind farm proposes Sunset Park factory
Via Wiki Commons
Move over Chicago, you’re no longer the only windy city – Brooklyn is about to get its own wind. Deepwater Wind, the nation’s leading wind-power developer, intends to build an assembly hub in Sunset Park to support the nation’s future largest offshore wind farm 30 miles east of Montauk (h/t Brooklyn Daily Eagle). This project is part of Governor Cuomo’s ambitious “Clean Energy Standard,” which intends to generate 50 percent of the state’s electricity supply from renewable sources by 2030. The Brooklyn factory is expected to generate $80 million in economic activity and create hundreds of jobs for the area.
The South Fork Wind Farm would be the second offshore wind farm in the US, after Rhode Island. The 256-square-mile site will have room for up to 200 turbines and will be able to power 50,000 homes. Most importantly to Long Island beachgoers, the wind farm will be out of sight from the beach. In addition to the assembly plant, Deepwater Wind intends to create a workforce training program.
The Eagle reports that Deepwater Wind Vice President Clinton Plummer told potential subcontractors “Help us build this project. We expect to put several hundred people to work.” Plummer even implied that if built, the Brooklyn factory could be involved in many other, future Deepwater Wind projects.
The factory would build the foundations that connect the wind turbine to the sea floor. These structures, that weight several hundred tons, require iron and steel workers, painters, and other “good-paying union jobs…We’re a union shop,” said Plumber.
He also said they are looking closely at Sunset Park. Maria Rocca, founder of the Friends of Sunset Park, is excited about the great job prospects this factory would create.
Governor Cuomo said, “New York leads the nation in pioneering clean energy innovation, and this bold action marks the next step in our unprecedented commitment to offshore wind, as well as our ambitious long-term energy goal of supplying half of all electricity from renewable sources by 2030. This project will not only provide a new, reliable source of clean energy but will also create high-paying jobs, continue our efforts to combat climate change and help preserve our environment for current and future generations of New Yorkers.”
Via the U.S. Wind Turbine Database (USWTDB)
Although the United States is not even close to the biggest wind farmers (like the Netherlands or the UK), our farms are quickly growing. A new dataset of wind turbine locations and capacity can be seen with this new interactive map, showing a total of 57,636 turbines in the country. Clearly, the east coast has some catching up to do and this new Brooklyn/Montauk project will literally put us on the map, along with Deepwater’s recently proposed Connecticut offshore wind farm.
[Via Brooklyn Daily Eagle]
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