Virginia, Maryland & North Carolina Announce New Offshore Wind Partnership

RICHMOND, VA -  Today, the Governors of Virginia, Maryland, and North Carolina announced a new regional partnership that seeks to attract and promote massive clean offshore wind development and thousands of clean energy jobs and billions of dollars to the region. 

The partnership, known as the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic Regional Transformative Partnership for Offshore Wind Energy Resources (SMART-POWER), commits the three states to collaborate to incentivize the production of needed parts, develop cost-effective supply chains, increase regulatory certainty, and exchange knowledge and best practices.

The Southeast and Mid Atlantic states have immense untapped potential to be an economic hub for clean offshore wind energy. According to the U.S. Energy Department, the Atlantic Coast offshore wind project pipeline is estimated to bolster up to  $57 billion in investments, support over 86,000 jobs, and provide up to $25 billion in economic output by 2030.

“The impacts of the climate crisis are felt especially hard in Mid-Atlantic states”, said Eileen Woll, Offshore Energy Program Director with the Sierra Club Virginia Chapter.  “It makes sense therefore that the Mid-Atlantic states come together to coordinate development of this exciting new American clean energy frontier industry. Virginia has set bold goals of attaining 100% clean energy by 2050 and offshore wind can and must make up a lion share of that 100% mix”.

Woll added, “there are currently over 27 gigawatts of offshore wind projects in the planning stages in the U.S., with 6.8 GW of that committed by MD, VA and NC to procurement.  Coming together regionally also makes the Mid-Atlantic that much more attractive to offshore wind manufacturers to locate here, which in turn creates tens of thousands of jobs in each of our respective states.”