EIA Toots US Wind Energy Horn With Offshore Lease Summary

Clean Technica: The US Energy Information Agency closed out 2016 by re-issuing some of its “favorite” observations from the last 12 months, and to cap the series it chose an article that summarizes the Interior Department’s offshore wind lease program for the Atlantic Coast states.

Just a wild guess, but by favorite the agency probably means most significant, and it certainly has hit the nail on the head with offshore wind — even though the US has barely gotten its first “steel in the water.”

Aside from this year’s commissioning of Rhode Island’s new Block Island offshore wind farm, the US has so far failed to tap into its massive offshore wind energy potential.

That’s too bad, particularly for Atlantic Coast states that are characterized by burgeoning urban centers in the north, industrial acceleration in the south, and a nice long, relatively shallow Continental Shelf of the US eastern seaboard, upon which wind farms are relatively easy to build.

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