The US Department of Interior (DOI) has announced the winners of its sixth offshore wind lease in Gulf of Maine (United States), namely Avangrid (US subsidiary of Spanish Iberdrola) and Invenergy. Of the eight leases put for sale, only four found a bidder, with Avangrid securing two leases (400 km2 lease for US$4.9m and a 505 km2 lease for just over US$6.2m) and Invenergy securing other two leases (396 km2 lease for US$4.9m and a 476 km2 lease for US$5.9m). If fully developed, the areas have the potential to power 2.3 million homes with green energy. The sale resulted in over US$5.4m in total bidding credits, representing binding commitments by the companies to invest over US$2.7m in workforce training and domestic supply chain development, and an additional US$2.7m for fisheries compensatory mitigation.
The tender, which was the first lease sale in the Gulf of Maine and the first sale for floating offshore wind on the US Atlantic coast, had eight areas over a 485 km2 area with a potential capacity of approximately 13 GW of clean offshore wind energy if fully developed.
The US federal government aims to install 30 GW offshore wind capacity by 2030 and 15 GW of offshore wind capacity by 2035. At the end of 2023, the United States had a total offshore wind capacity of 42 MW.
Do you want to become an expert on renewable energies auctions?
Discover our very detailed and regularly updated RES auctions database with worldwide coverage and a technical focus backed by academic research.
With our renewable energies auctions service you will be able to monitor auctions at a global level. Its (expanding) scope notably includes all major G20 countries and offers an especially fine tracking on Europe and South America.