Louisiana Proposes 5 GW of Offshore Wind for Gulf of Mexico
On February 1, 2022, Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards’ Climate Initiatives Task Force submitted its 177-page Climate Action Plan, which proposes a goal of 5 gigawatts (GW) of offshore wind (OSW) power generation by 2035 and notes that:
[T]his goal requires strategic collaboration across Louisiana state agencies and the federal government, transmission planning agencies, energy regulators, utilities, and the private sector to take additional steps to advance the development of offshore wind power generation. To spur large-scale, responsible development of this energy resource, efforts should prioritize early and repeated stakeholder outreach, strategic planning for anticipated transmission and workforce needs, and improving the understanding of potential environmental and social impacts and opportunities to avoid, address, or capitalize on them.
The Climate Action Plan also notes that, according to a 2020 report by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Louisiana ranks fourth in state offshore technical wind potential in the Gulf of Mexico, with over 200 GW of wind potential split almost equally between fixed-bottom OSW systems and floating OSW systems.
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