In 2021, the Biden Administration announced its goal to deploy 30 gigawatts of offshore wind energy by 2030, which would allow for the creation of nearly 77,000 jobs and meet the electricity demands for up to 10 million American households. The initiative also would offset 78 million metric tons of carbon dioxide, enabling the United States to meet its net zero emissions goal by 2050. With over 30 offshore renewable energy installation (OREI) projects (i.e., wind farms) in the works and the need for over 3,000 square miles of federally leased waters to support these projects, the Coast Guard must work diligently with industry partners to meet these new challenges.
The Coast Guard and Wind Energy
The Coast Guard is responsible for maritime law enforcement, saving and protecting life and property, safeguarding of navigation on the high seas and navigable waterways, and ensuring the readiness of military operations. The establishment of any structure on these waterways can impact the safety and navigation for all vessels in the U.S. Maritime Transportation System (MTS). However, the Coast Guard does not directly approve, disapprove, or permit OREIs. Instead, the Coast Guard works as a cooperating agency to a designated lead agency during an OREI project’s National Environmental Policy Act evaluation. The lead agency for an OREI project is either the Army Corps of Engineers when located within 3 nautical miles (nm) of the baseline, or the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management when located greater than 3 nm of the baseline.
The presence of an OREI off the United States coastline can affect the Coast Guard’s ability to conduct search and rescue (SAR) or maritime law enforcement. A fundamental issue is that each OREI is unique, meaning that the final design of one OREI may drastically vary from another due to various factors such as weather, marine life, geographic location, and topography of the sea floor—and that each OREI requires a unique approach. Thankfully, the Navigation and Vessel Inspection Circular (NVIC) 01-19 already provides guidance on how OREI developers should address the Coast Guard’s concerns during the design phase of each OREI project. Requiring a standard set of design criteria for all OREI projects (such as turbine separation distances, navigation lighting, etc.) is imperative to expedite project timelines and promote the creation of standardized Coast Guard operations in and around OREIs nationwide.
Offshore wind support vessels are in high demand and under construction to enable OREI project development. Various types of wind support vessels, such as crew transfer vessels, require the Coast Guard to oversee the design, construction, and inspection before they can be utilized in OREI production efforts. To prevent supply chain issues, the Coast Guard is working with shipbuilding industry partners to generate over 50 new crew transfer vessels in the next 10 to 15 years.
Challenges to Operations
Following recent design advancements, OREIs have begun to be placed further offshore. However, all planned OREI projects must remain within the economic exclusion zone in accordance with United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea Article 56, which grants a coastal-state rights over its natural resources such as wind energy. In December of 2020, Congress expanded the Coast Guard’s authority to enforce safety zones past 12 nm from the baseline. According to Title 33 CFR Chapter I, Subchapter N Part 147.10 (33CFR147.10), a captain of the port now can enforce a safety zone up to 200 nm from the baseline to support the installation and maintenance of an OREI. As a result, various Coast Guard districts have seen an uptick in requests for temporary safety zones to support the construction of OREIs. These increases in operational demand support Admiral Linda Fagan’s comments in the 2023 State of the Coast Guard Address calling for an increase of the annual U.S. Coast Guard budget to $20 billion by the year 2033 to ensure continued mission excellence across the service.
Once an OREI is constructed, the Coast Guard is not responsible for maintaining the physical aids to navigation (such as navigation lights) on each of the wind turbines; the company that owns the OREI must maintain these private aids to navigation and ensure that all federal requirements are met to promote safety of life at sea for vessels and aircrafts transiting nearby. However, offshore wind turbines have been shown to affect the capabilities of the Coast Guard’s Search and Rescue Optimal Planning System (SAROPS), which is used for drift modeling and search planning. The oscillating rotor blades and generator of a wind turbine emit high levels of electromagnetic interference that can affect high frequency radar capabilities around an OREI. Sensors on different Coast Guard aircraft, cutters, and boats can also be inversely affected by electromagnetic interference, potentially inhibiting Coast Guard assets and other vessels in the MTS from safely operating near an OREI.
Lastly, SAROPS utilizes local weather condition estimate in drift modeling to predict a survivor’s location in the water. Locations with a higher probability of finding the survivor drive search planning, which calculates how and where a search pattern should be conducted by a SAR asset—a calculation made more difficult by the unique challenges surrounding an OREI. One solution would be ensuring OREI developers place real-time weather stations in and around offshore wind farms to gather more accurate local weather conditions. Regardless, the Coast Guard continues to work with academia, federal, state, local, and industry stakeholders by participating in the Wind Turbine Radar Interference Mitigation Working Group to address these new challenges and further how to best mitigate radar interference caused by wind turbines.
Crucial Areas
Stakeholder Engagement
Stakeholder engagement is imperative for a robust MTS. Private wind energy companies are currently looking to build OREI projects in the Pacific Ocean, Gulf of Mexico, and the Atlantic Ocean. These projects will require temporary safety zones during construction. Meanwhile, commercial fisherman are concerned that federally leased waters for OREI projects will remain unavailable to them after completion. These worries are not unfounded. Some countries of the European Union already have indefinite restrictions on fishing in or near offshore wind farms due to safety of navigation concerns. These restrictions are in place to mitigate the associated risk of fishing gear becoming entangled with wind equipment and causing the sinking of a vessel or loss of life. Another concern amongst commercial fisherman is that the mere presence of a wind farm can begin to change the marine ecosystem and potentially cause populations of fish to decrease offshore. Since the Coast Guard has the authority to restrict access near an OREI, it will be crucial to maintain an open dialogue with the U.S. commercial fishing industry stakeholders to address their concerns.
The Coast Guard is also in charge of conducting port access route studies to ensure efficient and safe navigation of shipping vessels in the MTS. Continuous engagement with maritime shipping industry stakeholders must be done to propose shipping routes that promote lower traffic densities and address navigation challenges associated with OREIs.
Working closely with other federal partners will promote a seamless incorporation of OREIs into daily MTS operations. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) already distributes nautical charts that reflect changes to all coastal waters of the United States every year. Ensuring NOAA updates nautical charts with precise locations of OREIs will help educate mariners about where these installations are located and how to safely operate around them.
Furthermore, the Federal Aviation Administration and U.S. Navy share similar concerns about radar interference and retaining critical military training areas off the U.S. coasts. Wind turbines utilize secure telecommunications that incorporate real-time data collection and closed-circuit televisions to harness wind energy effectively. Ensuring that Bureau of Ocean Energy Management prioritizes cyber security in OREI projects, especially near frequent commercial aircraft traffic and military operations, will be critical to national security.
Live Training Exercises
On 1 January 2019, the F/V Mistress sank off the coast of Rhode Island with three people onboard near the Block Island Wind Farm. The Coast Guard responded but ended up suspending the search due to weather concerns. Ultimately, two of the three crew members were lost. Though the Coast Guard determined that the sinking was not attributed to the wind turbines, the case sparked interest in conducting a live SAR training exercise near the Block Island Wind Farm. The SAR exercise in July 2019 was the first of its kind in the United States and involved the participation of wind energy companies General Electric and Ørsted. It is imperative the Coast Guard conduct similar live training exercises in the future to grow confidence operating in OREIs and to identify new best practices in these unique areas.
Policy Updates
Lastly, the Coast Guard must remain vigilant in updating instruction manuals to account for the new challenges presented by OREIs. The process of updating applicable policy will be iterative, painstaking, and require continuous engagement with stakeholders and multiple real-life exercises to drive home how the Coast Guard should best operate in OREI environments.
The offshore wind energy industry presents an exciting new maritime endeavor for the Coast Guard to grow with and learn from. Through a focus in stakeholder engagement, live training exercises, and updates to applicable policy, the Coast Guard shall have no problem operating in conjunction with offshore wind energy installations in the maritime environment.
