Developer has eye on offshore wind

MAPLE RIDGE ARCHITECT: Project in Atlantic would have 200 turbines

By STEVE VIRKLER

TIMES STAFF WRITER

MONDAY, JANUARY 24, 2011

The primary architect of Maple Ridge Wind Farm is seeking to develop the nation's first offshore wind farm.

"I guess I like a challenge," said William M. Moore, now chief executive officer of Deepwater Wind in Providence, R.I. "And my enthusiasm for wind hasn't dampened a bit."

Deepwater Wind recently applied to federal authorities to construct a 200-turbine, 1,000-megawatt project in the Atlantic Ocean about 20 miles off the coast of Rhode Island. The estimated price tag for the project is $4.5 billion to $5 billion for the wind farm and an additional $500 million to $1 billion for the undersea transmission system.

However, the company's first completed project likely will be a five- to eight-turbine wind farm about 5 miles off Block Island, also in Rhode Island, Mr. Moore said. The relatively small size will make it easier to finance the project, although construction is not anticipated until 2013, he said.

"It will still probably be the first offshore project built in this country," Mr. Moore said.

Also in the running is Cape Wind, which earlier this month announced that it had completed its federal permitting process for a 468-megawatt wind farm in Nantucket Sound off Cape Cod. That project has received extensive national publicity, with opponents saying it is a hazard to aviation and wildlife and would mar historic vistas, including the view from the Kennedy family compound.

The Block Island project has had some public opposition, Mr. Moore said, but nothing like Cape Wind.

The company's other projects, which include a 350-megawatt proposed wind farm off the New Jersey coast, would be too far from shore to be seen by beachcombers, he said.

While land-based wind farms require extensive dealings with landowners, local governments and other regulatory agencies, offshore projects involve the federal government as the sole landowner, taxing jurisdiction and regulatory agency, Mr. Moore said.

"Whether that's really easy or not remains to be seen," he said.

The most difficult aspect of developing offshore projects is ensuring they are economically feasible, Mr. Moore said.

Offshore wind farms are much more expensive than land-based ones, with turbine manufacturers charging a lot more for warranties on their aquatic versions and ocean-floor bases costing much more than concrete bases on land, he said.

Deepwater Wind is proposing to use four-legged poles and 5-megawatt turbines with blades roughly twice as long as the 1.65-megawatt ones used at Maple Ridge.

In 1999, Mr. Moore, then owner of Atlantic Renewable Corp. out of Maryland, began showing up at Lewis County farms and town halls to propose a Tug Hill wind farm.

While his early proposal was for 50 turbines, the project ultimately grew into a 195-turbine, 320-megawatt wind farm — the largest one east of the Mississippi River — in the towns of Martinsburg, Harrisburg and Lowville that was completed in 2006.

Atlantic Wind eventually partnered with Zilkha Renewable Energy for the project, but both companies have changed names and ownership several times, with Mr. Moore's company having been bought out by PPM Energy of Portland, Ore.

PPM is now part of the Spanish company Iberdrola SA, while the other Maple Ridge part-owner is Houston-based Horizon Wind Energy LLC, which is owned by the Portuguese conglomerate Energias de Portugal.

Mr. Moore said the wind business, by necessity, has become more corporate over the past decade and is "not as romantic" as it was when he left Wall Street to become a self-funded developer.

Mr. Moore continued to work for PPM for a few years after the construction of Maple Ridge and began development work on the proposed 39-turbine Roaring Brook Wind Farm in Martinsburg.

He has been working at Deepwater Wind for the past couple of years and, on a more personal note, got married and is the father of 7-month-old twin sons.

Mr. Moore, who essentially lived at the Ridge View Motel in Lowville for several years, said he still tries to stop in Lewis County at least once a year, generally during trips to the Buffalo area to visit his wife's family.

ON THE NET

Deepwater Wind: www.dwwind.com

http://www.watertowndailytimes.com/article/20110124/NEWS04/301249981