October 6, 2010
Rutgers Gets $2 Million to Develop 3-D Offshore Wind Map
New Jersey is taking another step to assess its potential for developing offshore wind farms, a strategy that has emerged as a top priority of the Christie administration and many environmental groups.
The state Board of Public Utilities (BPU) yesterday awarded a $1.87 million contract to Rutgers University’s Institute of Marine and Coastal Science to build a three-dimensional map to detail the offshore wind potential of the Jersey coast.
The grant comes at a time when three developers of offshore wind farms are launching pilot studies to determine whether their projects are feasible based on how much electric capacity offshore wind farms can generate.
The latest project will complement those efforts and will be provided to other offshore wind developers once completed. The Rutgers’ map could lower the cost of future offshore wind projects, according to Michael Winka, director of the BPU’s Office of Clean Energy. The grant will fund a two-year project by the institute, which has been in the forefront of efforts to assess offshore wind potential.
According to the U.S. Energy Department, the U.S. has vast offshore wind resources, particularly off the eastern seaboard and in the Great Lakes. There are approximately 5,000 megawatts of projects that have been proposed in the U.S., including about 1,100 off the New Jersey coast. Read more…
