New Jersey’s offshore wind ‘energy mess’ draws heavy criticism from residents

Earlier this month, the Biden administration approved the construction of 195 wind turbines, the closest of which is just nine miles off the southern New Jersey coast, sparking outrage among residents of coastal towns.

While the Biden administration and other environmental groups are boasting that the Atlantic Shores South project, nearly nine years in the making, is another milestone in the nation’s green energy, a former U.S. Department of Energy engineer is sounding the alarm that the project will not only harm tourism and the ocean ecosystem, but will also increase energy costs by as much as 80% over the next 20 years.

The company behind the project, Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind, LLC (Atlantic Shores), holds three separate leases totaling more than 400 square miles with the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. There are plans for two separate projects with two lease areas located off the Jersey Shore between Atlantic City and Barnegat Light and a third lease located in an area of ​​the Atlantic Ocean known as the Bight.

“Project 1 and Project 2 are expected to generate up to 2,800 megawatts of electricity, enough to power nearly one million homes with clean, renewable energy,” according to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.

Although Atlantic Shores South says the project will generate $1.9 billion in economic benefits for the Garden State, an analysis by Edward P. O’Donnell of Whitestrand Consulting found that consumers — from residents to businesses and industry — across the state will see significant increases in their electricity bills.

“Offshore wind is not economically viable without large subsidies in the form of federal tax credits and guaranteed above-market prices for the power produced,” the study found. “The former is passed on to U.S. taxpayers, while the latter is a cost borne by New Jersey electricity ratepayers. Furthermore, accommodating the transmission of large amounts of offshore wind power to and through New Jersey requires large investments in modernizing and expanding the state’s transmission system.”

Project 1 is scheduled to begin construction in 2024, with first power delivered in 2027, bringing the Biden administration one step closer to deploying 30 gigawatts of offshore power by 2030, a goal that has been praised by environmental groups like the Sierra Club.

“We are proud to see New Jersey transitioning to renewable energy and offshore wind development away from dirty fossil fuels,” Sierra Club New Jersey Director Anjuli Ramos-Busot said in a statement. “The momentum for offshore wind in New Jersey is only growing as we continue to lead the region in our transformation toward a cleaner, greener future for our communities.”

The company says Project 1 alone will reduce New Jersey’s greenhouse gas emissions by 4 million tons per year, create nearly 50,000 jobs, generate $1.9 billion in economic benefits and produce enough clean energy to power 700,000 homes.

But Dr. Bob Stern, a former U.S. Department of Energy engineer and a Long Beach Island resident for 25 years, said the statistics on how many homes these windmills will power are incredibly misleading.

“It’s an intermittent source,” Stern said. “I see these statements and they’re carefully crafted, just like you can see a statement that says, ‘This project has the potential to power 10,000 homes,’ and it gives people the impression that this project is going to power all of those homes by itself. That’s not true because it’s only estimated to run 40 percent of the time, so really, if you look at your home’s power for the entire year, this project can’t do that by itself.”

Even Orsted, a renewable energy sustainability firm, states that with offshore wind there will always be “flexibility to use other sources such as onshore wind, sustainable biomass, solar and large-scale energy storage, which will help balance the grid and ensure the lights are always on.”

Ørsted even mentions that when the wind is too strong, offshore turbines are only effective in 1% of cases.

In looking at the issue, O’Donnell is mindful of New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy’s plan to add 11,000 megawatts of offshore wind power by 2040. That would mean more than $20 billion in federal tax subsidies for the investment, a small sum compared with the cost of expanding the generation and transmission system to move all the power from the coast to PJM’s grid.

“These subsidies to electricity customers will exceed $100 billion over 20 years and increase electricity rates by 55%, 70% and 85% for residential, commercial and industrial customers,” the report said.

To put that into perspective, a ratepayer paying 16 cents/kWh will see that price double to over 32 cents/kWr, increasing their annual bill by $1,000 by 2047. This will impact consumers across the state.

While rising electricity bills worries Stern, he is also concerned about the project’s impact on marine animals like whales.

“Underwater noise from all phases of this process, the ship surveys that use noise measuring devices to characterize the seabed, and then the noise from driving the foundation piles, and then ultimately the operation of these massive structures, all generate a lot of underwater noise,” Stern said. “We looked at this in detail and we think it will cause a tremendous amount of harm to whales, dolphins, especially whales that have to migrate to New Jersey to get where they’re going.”

But according to Stern, the situation will be even worse because commercial, military and fishing vessel traffic will not be allowed in the wind complex.

“So they’re going to be squeezed into these narrow corridors,” Stern said. “It turns out that the corridors they’re going to be squeezed into are also the migration corridor for the whales. Now you’re not only creating a hazard for the whales, but you’re also creating a hazard for the ships.”

In the Bureau of Oceans and Energy Management’s environmental impact review, the agency acknowledged that the South Atlantic coast would have a serious impact on the North Atlantic white whale population, as there are fewer than 400 left in the wild.

Stern, who organized Save Long Beach Island to oppose the project, said there is also concern among community members that the windmills, a nuisance just a few miles from the coast, would negatively impact tourism.

The Long Beach Island Chamber of Commerce said in an email that it opposes the project but would not comment on the matter.

“Why are we doing this?” Stern said. “People come out and say we have to do this for climate change, but even the agency documents say it has very little impact on climate change because there are so many more dynamics going on with the rest of the world.”

Stern and his colleagues from Save Long Island Beach are not giving up and have announced that they will take the case to court.

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“It’s an energy waste,” Stern said. “Unfortunately, it’s also a dangerous waste, and I think the country will regret it.”

This Washington Examiner requested comment from the Office of Ocean Management and Atlantic Shores.