As far as I’m concerned, this New Year is off to a resounding start, with the wind industry and Green cabal already taking a pounding right out of the proverbial gate.

Yesterday’s late good news is so, SO schweet.

INTO MY VEINS

Another huge blow for renewable energy to fight climate change:

BP and Equinor have scrapped a massive offshore wind power project off New York's Long Island.

Empire Wind 2 can't go forward b/c of cost increases.

The whales win again! 🐳https://t.co/ItKvQlxgjS

— Ryan Maue (@RyanMaue) January 3, 2024

I covered what is proving to be the origin story of this happy day back in mid-October. The companies contracted for the proposed “Empire Wind” – European “energy giants” Equinor and BP (British Petroleum) – hadn’t put a stick in the water yet, but had come to the cold calculation that what they had agreed to when they bid for the project as far as what they’d receive for the power produced, etc., wasn’t going to begin to cover the costs of actually building it out. So they, along with developers of several other projects along the NY/NJ coast in the same financial squeeze, petitioned the New York Public Service Commission (PSC) for increases in the offtakes and allowable charges to consumers.

What they were asking for increase-wise was hardly chicken feed in a NY metropolitan area already beset and bedeviled by insane utility prices.

…“Without this adjustment” as if it was merely a system tweak or something no one would even notice. The numbers in the actual increases the companies were asking for were something more than “adjustments.”

…New York Public Service Commission (PSC) denied petitions by the state’s two offshore wind developers, joint ventures (JVs) of Equinor-BP and Orsted-Eversource, for increases to offtake contracts as high as 55%, which one PSC member reportedly described as “breathtaking”.

…According to the petition, the Equinor-BP JV was calling for “a 54% increase on average across its portfolio”, which includes the 2.1GW Empire Wind 1 & 2 and 1.2GW Beacon Wind arrays.

The JV was seeking different rates across its three projects, with Beacon the highest at 55%. This would raise its rate from $118 per MWh to $190.82/MWh – the most among all projects.

Orsted-Eversource partnership requested a smaller hike of 27% increase for its 920MW Sunrise Wind farm, to $139.99/MWh.

For once, to their great credit, the PSC looked to customers’ interests vice the state’s agenda, called the developers’ bluffs, and, in a unanimous decision, told every last wind company, “YGTBFKM. HAY-YULL, no!”

And sent them on their way empty handed.

Another twist in this particular Empire Wind project that received little attention but accelerated its road to doom was a critical veto by, of all people, rabidly Green NY governor Kathy Hochul.

I know – knock me over with a feather, right?

It turns out that the residents of Long Beach, a really nice, oceanfront neighborhood on Long Island, took noisy and particular exception to plans the wind farm had for running their essential off-shore transmission line up onto and through the little city’s very beautiful and uber popular beachfront. Equinor was going take that massive line right through the center of town.

“Oh, hay-yull, no” Long Beach said.

And the governor listened, because there are a lot of voters in Long Island’s Nassau County that Dems need badly. Also, Hochul probably figured the writing was on the wall after the PSC turned the rate increases down, so she could afford to take a little climate cult heat. (FYI: The Long Beach City Council swung Republican a week after Hochul’s veto)

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul vetoed a bill that would have expedited an offshore wind project off the coast of Long Island and allowed for a transmission line under the public beach in the city of Long Beach.

“It is incumbent on renewable energy developers to cultivate and maintain strong ties to their host communities,” Hochul wrote in her veto message. “Here, the City Council of Long Beach, the host community for the wind power project, has made clear that, while it supports the state’s efforts to transition from the use of fossil fuels, it would not support or authorize any alienation of parkland.”

The veto drew recrimination from clean energy supporters who have long been waiting for New York’s offshore wind projects to get underway. The downstate region’s energy sector has become increasingly reliant on natural gas and other fossil fuels in recent years to power one of the world’s most densely populated regions.

Long Beach City Council President John Bendo says residents are acutely aware of rising sea levels and the need for more renewable energy, but that they opposed bringing the power transmission line through the center of town and its beach.

And again, just as with so many projects I’ve covered here, company arrogance played a yuge part. Developers expected to roll right over the community involved with a government assist.

…Bendo faults the wind developer, Equinor, for not addressing the community’s concerns.

“We begged them to implement some kind of public engagement process to talk to the residents. If you want to sell your project to residents, you need to explain to them what benefits are there for them,” Bendo said.

“And they just did nothing. They didn’t lift a finger.”

Stick a fork in them – the wind farm was DONE.

…Ari Brown, a Republican state assemblymember from Nassau County, said this veto essentially kills the project.

“Could someone introduce another bill where the cable won’t make landfall and be further out to sea? Maybe.” Brown said in an interview. “It’s just not economically viable for the company to do it. That’s the problem.”

Here we are today.

NEWS: Equinor and BP cancel New York contract for Empire Wind 2, which asked for the biggest (percentage wise) cost increase of any OSW project and was rebuffed by regulatorshttps://t.co/Ccs8DwUApW

— Marie French (@m_jfrench) January 3, 2024

Both companies are throwing in the towel while hanging on to the washcloth of “there’s always another day.”

Equinor and bp have terminated New York State’s Empire Wind 2 offshore wind farm – but a do-over isn’t out of the question.

The two companies have agreed with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) to terminate the Offshore Wind Renewable Energy Certificate (OREC) Agreement for the 1,260 megawatt (MW) Empire Wind 2.

Equinor and bp said that the decision to terminate Empire Wind 2 was due to “commercial conditions driven by inflation, interest rates, and supply chain disruptions” that prevented its existing OREC agreement from being viable.

…However, the two companies are still very much at the table, as they called this cancellation a “reset” in their announcement and say they are “seeking new offtake opportunities.” They said that the already mature project might get a second life in some shape or form because there’s support from the state to revive the faltering projects.

There might be some “support from the state” as far as revival hopes go, but every wind farm project that fails is like striking down Obi Wan Kenobi – it makes opponents stronger. More people climb onboard the anti-wind train every day, and the forces battling are more vocal, they’re much better organized with access to legal and media resources they never had before, and are also communicating with sister organizations about what works and on the status of their campaigns.

That coordination among foes and basic economics of the wind industry itself, from manufacturing difficulties to unrealized results, coupled with the disaster that is #Bidenomics and vanishing government subsidies have wreaked havoc with developers and projects.

…The rejection was just the latest blow to the US offshore wind industry, which is struggling to adjust to rising inflation, supply-chain issues and other factors that have driven up costs. Many projects are in jeopardy as developers are forced to recalculate the numbers for proposals originally modeled years ago.

“It appears that the economies of scale just aren’t enough to help these projects amid these macroeconomic events,” said Timothy Fox, an analyst at ClearView Energy Partners. “All those projects were on the bubble, so it’s not surprising that Equinor and BP want to reduce some of the risk they’re facing.”

About 17.5 gigawatts of US offshore wind projects have won state contracts, and proposals representing more than half of that are in dispute or have been canceled, according to Fox. Those include the Ocean Wind 1 and 2 developments in New Jersey with more than 2.2 gigawatts of capacity that Orsted A/S stopped late last year. One gigawatt is comparable to a big, conventional nuclear power plant.

In New Jersey, where verminous Governor Phil Murphy has been one of the biggest proponents of shoving off-shore debacles down his constituents’ throats, even the legendary NJ Democratic machine’s hold on legislators is slipping when it comes to wind, thanks to those very constituents and their ever-more-united opposition.

This is today’s headline from a local NJ radio station. Jeez – how do you think they REALLY feel…?

Blown Away: Another enormous wind failure for Murphy in NJ

…While Murphy, legislative Democrats and environmentalists aggressively promoted the benefits of offshore wind projects, Republicans, members of the public and local government officials were equally opposed.

Shore towns expressed concerns about the impact to tourism.

Republicans worried about the cost and the potential impact to marine life.

But even support from key Democrats had begun to fade in recent months.

New Jersey Senate President Nick Scutari and Assembly Speaker Craig Coughlin put out a statement questioning the state’s commitment and the cost. They had suggested pausing development for more study of the impact.

Has to be so frustrating for the Green grifters.

WHAT A PITY

And so, SO schweet.