Statoil’s NY Offshore Wind Project Named 'Empire Wind'
The 79,350 acre site, secured by Statoil in a federal auction in December 2016, has the potential to generate up to 1GW of offshore wind power for New York City and Long Island, according to Statoil, making it a key part of New York State’s plan to deploy renewable energy sources to meet the state’s electricity needs.
New York’s Clean Energy Standard mandates an increase in the share of renewables in its energy mix to 50 percent by 2030. As part of that effort, Governor Andrew Cuomo recently called for the development of up to 2.4 gigawatts of offshore wind power by 2030.
Statoil currently has seven offshore wind projects online or under development in Europe, including the world’s first floating offshore wind project in Scotland—a technology which could also prove pivotal in generating offshore wind power for the U.S. west coast and Hawaii. The company’s offshore wind portfolio has the capacity of providing more than one million European homes with renewable energy.