WASHINGTON D.C. U.S. Secretary of Interior Debbie Haaland announced that the U.S. government will auction lease agreements for seven offshore locations to build wind power generating farms.
The sites are located in the Central Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico, Gulf of Maine, New York, and near the coasts of Carolina, California, and Oregon.
The United States has begun a more aggressive push for developing offshore wind development, even though it still stands behind Europe.
The U.S. government has set its sights on boosting wind power capacity to nearly 30,000 megawatts by the next decade. In Europe, with the largest offshore wind capacity, last year almost half that figure had been installed.
The largest offshore wind projects are typically located along the United States East Coast. Some of the problems needed to be solved include those caused by shallower waters in the Pacific Ocean, making anchoring platforms more difficult.
According to the announcement of the Biden administration in May, wind power development is to be permitted off the Central and North California shores and hinted at possibly developing novel technology for offshore wind farms.
The low depth of the waters coupled with small wave heights is advantageous for wind power development in the Gulf. Moreover, the U.S. offshore wind industry can make use of existing facilities and regional offshore oil along with the experience in gas drilling to maximize offshore wind speeds.