4 hours not enough for vote on Revolution Wind proposal in R.I.

PROVIDENCE — People have a lot to say about the Revolution Wind offshore wind project proposal.

 

In fact, they have so much to say that even after a four-hour meeting Tuesday night, the Rhode Island Coastal Resources Management Council had to adjourn instead of voting on whether the agency should sign off on the proposal. The room in a Department of Administration building in Providence was only available until about 10 p.m., and as the clock neared that hour, the chair of the CRMC asked how many more people wanted to speak. At least a half-dozen hands shot up.

 

Instead of continuing to push it, the council set a new date: May 9. Public input will pick back up then.

 

CRMC had heard from the developer, from an advisory board for fishers who are concerned about the project and say more needs to be done to accommodate for the effects on their way of life, and then from members of the public on both sides of the divide before the meeting ended.

 

Revolution Wind would bring 400 megawatts of power to Rhode Island and 304 to Connecticut, the first utility-scale project to bring power directly to Rhode Island. Though it’s in federal waters, the CRMC has the authority to certify whether the project is consistent with its coastal policies, a crucial part of the regulatory process that will also have to go to the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.

 

The developers have proposed a nearly $13 million fund to compensate for potential effects on fishers, which could be boosted by as much as $5 million if the effects are worse than thought. If the effects are less than thought, the developer would recoup up to $2.5 million.

 

Advocates said the proposal is necessary as Rhode Island tries to confront climate change, while the Fishermen’s Advisory Board, an internal panel that advises the CRMC, asked for additional mitigation measures.

 

The Globe’s first report in the lead-up to the vote follows:

 

PROVIDENCE — The state’s coastal regulator is set to vote Tuesday on what would be the first major offshore wind turbine project that would bring power directly to Rhode Island. The agency’s professional staff recommends signing off on the proposal, but a group of fishermen is raising concerns.

 

The Rhode Island Coastal Resources Management Council is scheduled to vote on whether the Revolution Wind project is consistent with Rhode Island’s coastal policies. The project, a joint venture between the utility Eversource and the developer Ørsted, would provide 400 megawatts of power to Rhode Island and 304 megawatts to Connecticut. That is significantly larger than the first-in-the-nation Block Island wind farm’s 30 megawatts.

 

The scheduled vote Tuesday is a crucial step toward making the project a reality, though it is not the last one: The federal government’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management needs to sign off, too. The vote on Tuesday, if it goes forward as scheduled, is on whether to certify to BOEM that the project aligns with Rhode Island’s coastal policies.

 

The nuances here may be small, but the impact of the project could be significant as the state pursues its climate-reduction targets while also trying to account for impacts to aquatic life and the fishing industry.

 

In this case, the agency’s professional staff recommends that the politically appointed council sign off on Revolution Wind based on steps the developer has agreed to take to minimize harm. The developer has agreed to reduce the number of turbine foundation positions, to place the foundations and the cables in areas that would do the least harm to important marine life habitats, and to take steps to reduce the risk to snagging commercial fishing gear. The developers will also have to do research and monitoring as part of the final federal approval.

 

But not everyone’s on board. Boats wouldn’t be able to navigate in certain areas, and the construction and operation of the project would disturb and move glacial moraine habitat and boulders. The project area is in part on Cox Ledge, which is dominated by complex glacial moraine habitat and is one of the last places in southern New England where Atlantic cod is found throughout all its life stages.

 

How much of an effect would the project have? And how much money will the developer pay to make up for it? The developer and an internal CRMC board made up of fishermen don’t agree.

 

Revolution Wind is proposing to pay about $12.9 million to mitigate for potential losses in what it called its best and final offer. That would include $12 million in direct compensation for the commercial and charter fishing industries. Revolution Wind would also pay into community funds, pay for a study of the effects of the project, and fund a voucher program for navigational equipment.

 

“This compensation number was arrived at after extensive, collaborative discussions between the relevant parties,” Revolution Wind said in an emailed statement, adding later: “These measures are in addition to other steps we’ve already taken to support coexistence with other marine users, including leading the way on the adoption of uniform, 1 nautical mile by 1 nautical mile spacing across all Northeast wind lease areas.”

 

But the Fishermen’s Advisory Board, an internal panel that advises CRMC on wind power issues, said the economic loss would be more significant than Revolution Wind says. And it is not on board with the dollar amount of $12.9 million that Revolution Wind is proposing.

 

“There are a number of points that I disagree with Orsted’s economic experts,” said Todd Guilfoos, the FAB’s economic expert. “The siting of many of these wind farms have been located in highly valuable areas to the fishing community, many which should have never been leased by BOEM. Both the developer and BOEM have not demonstrated a balanced approach to development of the wind farms or taken the concerns of the fishing industry seriously.”

 

The FAB on Monday, through its legal counsel at Desautel Law, submitted a list of mitigation measures that it said CRMC should require as part of the approval. The 19-item list includes things like barring construction in November and December to protect cod populations and limiting the speed of vessels at certain times of the year.

 

CRMC’s staff said the proposal is consistent with the state’s coastal policy, based on steps the developer has already agreed to take, but would also be consistent with coastal policy with a $12.9 million compensation package and with the mitigation measures the FAB requested.

 

The turbines would be in federal waters, about 15 miles south of Rhode Island’s coast. The state has jurisdiction over the project because of the state’s coastal regulations.

 

CRMC’s politically appointed council makes big-picture decisions while taking the professional staff’s advice into account, but it doesn’t necessarily have to follow that advice. One example when they did not do so was earlier in this very project during the approval of the project’s cables: They voted not to require the cable approval to go through the General Assembly first, irritating the legislative body’s leadership and providing ammunition to critics who are calling for wholesale change. The cables would make landfall at the Quonset Business Park in North Kingstown.

 

Other offshore wind projects are further along in the pipeline, but would bring power to places besides Rhode Island, like New York in the case of the South Fork project and Massachusetts in the case of Vineyard Wind.

 

Revolution Wind would have 67 foundations for 65 turbine positions and two substations, according to the staff report. Revolution Wind is also not to be confused with the newly minted Revolution Wind 2.