And this list will undoubtedly grow in the coming weeks and months as more companies seek to get an early foot in the door of what is expected to be an enormous and potentially lucrative new sector. Let s not forget that despite the massive potential for green hydrogen to decarbonise transport, heating and heavy industry, this is still a nascent sector the largest electrolyser currently in operation is only 20MW.
The thinking behind leaping from megawatt-scale to gigawatt-scale is that the future demand for green H
2 will be gigantic, and that costs can be quickly driven down through economies of scale, with a view to making renewable hydrogen cheaper than highly polluting grey (produced from unabated natural gas or coal) by 2030.
Print this article
The Biden administration greenlit the first large-scale offshore wind project this month in a move that could help jumpstart an industry that thus far has been stagnant in the United States.
It’s a small first step toward meeting
a goal President Joe Biden set in March for the U.S. to deploy 30 gigawatts of offshore wind power by 2030, but the country has a long way to go. Currently, the U.S. only has two small-scale pilot offshore wind projects in operation, one off the coast of Rhode Island and the other off the coast of Virginia, totaling about 42 megawatts of power.
The Vineyard Wind project, it said, was expected to generate 3,600 jobs and provide enough power for 400,000 homes and businesses.
The DOI added that a Record of Decision had granted Vineyard Wind final federal approval to install 84 or fewer turbines off Massachusetts as part of an 800-megawatt offshore wind energy facility.
According to the Vineyard Wind team, the facility will use GE Renewable Energy s huge Haliade-X turbines, which will mean only 62 will actually be required.
Vineyard Wind is a 50-50 joint venture between Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners and Avangrid Renewables. The latter is a subsidiary of Avangrid, which is part of the Iberdrola Group, a major utility headquartered in Spain.