Dive Brief:
- The California Energy Commission authorized $42.75 million in grants for offshore wind port development on Wednesday, in what commission staff described as the first appropriation of the state’s Climate Bond funds for offshore wind.
- Last month, California state lawmakers also authorized $225.7 million in spending for offshore wind ports and related facilities through June 2030, with funds coming from a $10 billion Climate Bond approved by voters in 2024.
- The construction of supportive ports and transmission systems in California is critical to deploying commercial floating offshore wind by the mid 2030s, according to a survey by offshore wind industry trade association Oceantic.
Dive Insight:
Despite stop-work orders and project cancellations on the East Coast, California’s status as a global leader in floating offshore wind development remains unchanged, according to Oceantic Senior Policy Director Nancy Kirshner-Rodriguez.
“States have always been the driving force of our industry, and will continue to be, regardless of who is in power,” she said. “They are creating the demand signals that will pull in investment, and they are underwriting the critical enabling infrastructure investments that make the market move forward.”
The Port San Luis Harbor District — one of five entities that received grants from the CEC last week to fund offshore wind port planning, engineering and design — is on track to become the state’s first dedicated offshore wind hub, according to Reid Boggiano, a CEC offshore wind program specialist. The Port of Long Beach is also well on its way to building Pier Wind, a dedicated 400-acre offshore wind terminal that the CEC awarded $20 million to wrap up planning and engineering and to complete environmental assessments.
The Humboldt Bay Harbor and the cities of Oakland and Richmond also received grants for feasibility studies to determine if those communities could host offshore wind ports.
“It’s essential that we decarbonize the power sector in California … and that involves having a diversity of resources — everything from solar to geothermal to terrestrial wind,” CEC chair David Hochschild said during the Oct. 8 meeting where the grants were approved. “But offshore wind is a really important element of that. The wind resource offshore is significantly better and stronger and more enduring than the wind on land. And there’s been an enormous amount of innovation that’s driving costs down.”
Public comment at the meeting overwhelmingly supported the grants, but a handful of residents spoke against the funds. Two argued that the CEC should table the vote to ensure the grants didn’t duplicate local studies that are already underway, while a third argued that the funds should be redirected toward other renewable energy projects canceled by the Trump administration.
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