BOEM received no competitive interest for Gulf of Maine research lease
By:
Tom Russell
20/01/2023
BOEM
The Bureau of Ocean Energy
Management (BOEM) announced a Determination of No Competitive Interest
for a proposed research lease area offshore Maine. This decision follows
BOEM’s Request for Competitive Interest (RFCI) in the Gulf of Maine, which
was issued last August.
BOEM’s determination
means it will move forward with the State of Maine’s research application,
which could be used to inform any future commercial offshore wind development
in the Gulf of Maine, as well as the deployment of floating offshore wind
technology nationwide.
On October 1, 2021, BOEM received an application from the State of Maine
for a research lease requesting 9,700 acres on the U.S. Outer Continental
Shelf in a location more than 20 nautical miles off the Maine coast. If
developed, the research site would consist of up to 12 floating offshore
wind turbines capable of generating up to 144 MW of renewable energy.
BOEM received complete submissions to the RFCI from two qualified entities.
However, following a careful review of the submissions, BOEM concluded
there was no competitive interest in the RFCI area due to concerns about
commercial scale viability in the proposed research lease area.
The determination of no competitive interest in the RFCI area does not
guarantee that the State of Maine will receive a research lease. The next
steps for processing the research application include publishing a Determination
of No Competitive Interest in the Federal Register and initiating an environmental
review of potential impacts from offshore wind leasing activities associated
with the research lease.