US Senators Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) and Angus King (I-Maine) have introduced legislation that would provide adjacent offshore wind leaseholders with an expedited route to acquire surrendered lease areas and pause new offshore oil and gas leasing until those areas have been transferred or reoffered. The legislation follows several recent offshore wind project cancellations and proposed lease relinquishments involving projects in California, New York and Louisiana.
RWE recently announced an agreement under which the US administration would pay the company $1.22 billion to abandon offshore wind leases and redirect funds towards fossil fuel investments.
The legislation would require the Department of the Interior to offer surrendered lease areas to adjacent offshore wind leaseholders at the original per-acre auction price, without requiring additional Bureau of Ocean Energy Management approval or issuance. Any unclaimed acreage would be returned to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management for reoffering under the same terms as the original lease, while previous environmental reviews would remain in place. Developers that surrendered leases would be barred from reacquiring them.
The bill would also pause the issuance of new offshore oil and gas leases or permits until all surrendered offshore wind acreage has been transferred or reoffered.
The senators said the legislation is intended to support continued offshore wind development and prevent previously leased areas from being left unused. Padilla and King have also criticised the US administration's policies towards offshore wind and its support for increased fossil fuel development.
The legislation follows other recent actions concerning offshore wind projects. In June, the US administration pressured Invenergy to abandon its Even Keel Wind project in California, while Ocean Winds and Reventus Power cancelled the planned Golden State Wind project in April. The three projects had a combined planned capacity of more than 5 GW.
