Massachusetts Legislation Facilitates Grid Connection of 800-Megawatt Vineyard Wind Offshore Project

Massachusetts state lawmakers on July 22 passed a bill that authorizes the Barnstable Town Council to grant an easement for a portion of Covell’s Beach to construct the interconnection between Vineyard Wind LLC’s offshore wind project and the New England power grid. The 800-megawatt project, jointly owned by Avangrid Renewables LLC and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, would be the first large-scale offshore wind development in the U.S.

Vineyard Wind said that the approval follows a “Host Community Agreement” with the Town of Barnstable, which was unanimously supported by the Barnstable Town Council last October. Under the agreement, the town will receive annual payments of at least $1.53 million in property taxes and host community payments, guaranteeing $16 million in total, which will be used in municipal water protection efforts.

Vineyard Wind has asked the Massachusetts Energy Facility Siting Board for a comprehensive certificate “representing a composite of all remaining state and local permits, approvals, licenses, certificates, or other forms of authorizations that would otherwise apply to the project but have not yet been obtained in final, non-appealable form,” according to a July 24 application.

The developer announced on July 12 that the Edgartown Conservation Commission denied a permit to install offshore transmission cables, and it plans to seek a superseding order from the state’s Department of Environmental Protection to overrule the denial.

In April, state regulators authorized power purchase agreements between Vineyard Wind LLC and the state’s electric distribution companies Unitil Corp., National Grid plc, and Eversource Energy for a period of 20 years. The project was selected last year to negotiate contracts with Massachusetts’ electric utilities, in accordance with legislation enacted in 2016 that requires competitive solicitations to secure long-term contracts for 1,600 megawatts of offshore wind by June 30, 2027.

Avangrid is owned by Iberdrola SA.