“When you plug in to the grid, you want to plug in to the arteries,” Hines says. The arteries, or bigger power lines, can carry more electricity. To understand why, Eric Hines, who directs the offshore wind energy graduate program at Tufts University, says it’s helpful to picture the transmission system as a network of arteries, veins and capillaries. Experts say this so-called “project-by-project” approach is fine for now, but very soon, there will be two big problems.įirst, we are going to run out of places like Brayton Point to plug into - in fact, almost all of the most desirable locations have already been claimed along the southern New England, New York and New Jersey coastlines.Īnd second, it will require really costly upgrades to the onshore transmission system. use this design, running the equivalent of a high-voltage extension cord from wind farms to open substation near the coast. To date, all offshore wind projects in the U.S. “Then the electrons are out and spreading the green energy around.” “And from there, it goes into the public's grid system,” Mott says, gesturing to the big overhead power lines in the distance. Those cables will resurface at a beach near Brayton Point, and the electricity will eventually make its way to the substation. Each turbine will send the power it generates to a nearby offshore platform, and from there, the electricity gets sent to shore through big cables buried six feet beneath the ocean floor. It will all begin 30 miles offshore, where someday in the not-too-distant future, strong winds will spin the project’s turbines to generate electricity. The humming equipment behind him, which once served as the link between New England’s largest coal-fired power plant and the grid, is about to get a new green life, he says. Mott works for the offshore wind developer Mayflower Wind, and his specialty is the transmission system, the substations and high voltage power lines that move electricity long distances. Lawrence Mott stands by a tall metal fence surrounding the electrical substation at Brayton Point in Somerset. Wind developers can fairly easily run high voltage cables from their offshore projects to land, but once that power comes ashore it encounters an electrical grid that wasn’t set up to handle it.Įast coast states could rebuild the onshore power grid to accommodate this power, or they could put the bulk of their effort into building an “ocean grid” - something experts say may be cheaper, faster and better for the environment. Offshore wind has a problem: electrical transmission. Facebook Email The remains of one of Brayton Point's 500-foot tall cooling tower.

National grid type b need a permit