State, US Wind sign lease amid legal battles

DAGSBORO – US Wind was offered another green flag by the state of Delaware as it prepares to install more than 100 wind turbines off of Delaware’s Sussex County coastline amid already turbulent waters.

Then-Gov. John Carney and Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC) Secretary Shawn Garvin signed agreements with US Wind Jan. 6, a day before Carney was sworn in as the new mayor of Wilmington. Garvin announced that he, too, would resign from his top spot in the state the day after the agreements were signed.

The documents included an agreement from DNREC’s State Energy Office and US Wind, detailing 150,000 renewable energy credits to be transferred each year to Delaware utilities as associated with wind generation from the project. According to a press release from the state of Delaware, the credits have an estimated value of $76 million over the life of the projects.

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The signed agreements also include moneys to be given from US Wind to fund coastal waterway dredging, clean energy workforce training, environmental scholarships, and resiliency and capital projects at state parks coming to a value of $40 million over 20 years.

The lease signed grants US Wind underground access to the Delaware State Parks for power transmission cables at Delaware Seashore State Parks to the tune of more than $12 million over 25 years.

While the state said the agreements support a first for the Mid-Atlantic region, opponents say it’s too soon to move forward to such connections.

US Wind successfully secured permits from the state of Delaware and the federal government for the Maryland Offshore Wind Project, connecting the two states for the effort which plans to bring 114 wind turbines to the water just off the coast of Delaware, as well as four underground transmission cables spanning 15 miles under the same coast, bringing wind energy through the parking lot of 3R’s Beach in Delaware Seashore Park and connecting it to the proposed 142-plus acres substation in Dagsboro owned by US Wind subsidiary Renewable Redevelopment LLC

Although Maryland state officials also gave the green light for the process, approving a wind lease for a part of the coast in Ocean City, Md. in 2017, the planning process must also include a local conditional use permit from Sussex County which was denied by county council members last month. US Wind has already filed an appeal against the action and lawsuits are swarming from advocates in both Delaware and Maryland.

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“The truth is they [the state] have simply disregarded any legal impediment and continued moving forward with the process,” attorney Jane Brady told the Delaware Business Times.

Formerly, Brady was elected as Delaware’s attorney general three times and was the chair of the Republican Party of Delaware and a judge of the Delaware Superior Court. She is the current chairwoman for A Better Delaware.

She attributed the agreements to leaders believing that the court and legal issues facing them will “fall in line,” but she doesn’t think that will be the case this time.

“It’s unbelievable to me. We get some money out of the deal, but it’s barely tangible. It simply can’t address the concerns real people have here about this project,” she said. “They’re planning to go under the Indian River Bay. The Environmental Protection Agency and Marine Fisheries both recommended not going underneath the bay because it’s such an important part of the Indian River ecosystem and the fact that they would disregard that is awful.”

Although the state and US Wind have both signed the agreements announced in early January, plans for the wind farm are still up in the air while the appeals process and lawsuits continue to work through the system.

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