US military and energy agencies sign offshore wind pact
Agreement between DoD and BOEM codifies longstanding agreements to share coastal areas vital to both national security and energy transition
The US Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) and the Department of Defense (DoD) signed a memorandum of understanding Tuesday to support coordinated offshore wind development along the nation’s coastal waters.
BOEM director Elizabeth Klein and assistant secretary of defense for energy, installations, and environment Brendan Owens signed the MoU during a ceremony at American Clean Power Association (ACP)’s offshore wind conference in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
“Collaboration with the Department of Defense is really crucial to ensure that we're carrying out our offshore wind development efficiently and sustainably, while also minimising the impacts to military operations,” said Klein at the signing event.
“The MoU helps to define and clarify roles and teams across our organisations and releasing project planning processes,” she added.
DoD provides all US military forces and makes extensive use of coastal waters for training and operations and has already participated in every regional offshore wind planning body.
The Central Atlantic wind energy planning area extending from the Carolinas to Delaware is especially prone to competition with military operations, with states seeking at least 20GW of capacity in waters with high levels of armed forces activity.
DoD and BOEM, under the Department of the Interior, “have worked together to identify and avoid impacts to national security for offshore energy planning, and this MoU codifies the way that we would do that going forward,” said Owens.
“We view political clean energy transition, offshore wind in particular, as vital to national security and DoD is fully committed to working across the entire federal government, particularly BOEM, to drive those priorities forward,” Owens added.
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