CCAs band together to receive power from first-ever California floating offshore wind project

California Community Power, a joint powers authority that conducts joint power procurement on behalf of nine California Community Choice Aggregators (CCAs), has joined forces with developer CADEMO to execute a MOU on a 60-MW floating offshore wind project off the California coast.

This MOU is intended to establish a collaborative engagement between CC Power and CADEMO to support the development of the CADEMO project as California’s first offshore wind project. The project will be located off the coast of Vandenberg Space Force Base, near Lompoc, in California state waters. It is targeting a commercial operation date in 2028.

The project is expected to include four turbines, totaling 60 MW, and is expected to produce about 200 GWh/year. CADEMO has conducted extensive local engagement with local tribes, labor unions, and workforce development agencies. As the first commercial floating wind project in the nation, CADEMO will develop best practices in environmental management and stakeholder relations and will mature the necessary supply chains for California’s offshore wind industry.

Through the MOU engagement, CC Power aims to learn about the drivers of key costs in offshore wind development to build support for appropriate policies that balance local investment, jobs and community considerations, greater renewable energy penetration, and electricity affordability. CC Power and CADEMO anticipate, in collaboration with CC Power’s CCA members, engaging with local communities to ensure the CADEMO project “gets built right” by facilitating community stakeholder sessions and acknowledging and integrating the perspectives of various local community members into the project’s development.

CC Power and CADEMO endeavor to apply for grants, incentives, and other support to minimize the cost of offtake from the CADEMO project while maximizing the value of the project’s power output. These efforts comprise a roadmap intended to drive the parties toward the potential for a power purchase agreement between them, with the energy benefits and costs flowing to the participating CC Power member CCAs.

“We’re excited to embark on this journey with CADEMO. This MOU marks an important step in CC Power’s efforts to support the rational development of floating offshore wind in California as an additional power generation resource that our CCA members can rely upon to provide clean, renewable energy and capacity benefits to serve their customers,” said CC Power General Manager Alex Morris. “The CADEMO project serves as a useful test case for how to build offshore wind projects on the West Coast and is unique in how soon it may be able to begin delivering power and development learnings to the power sector here in California, with its potential 2028 commercial operation date. CC Power is proud to play an influential role in supporting California’s ambitions for offshore wind development.”

Mikael Jakobsson, Director of CADEMO, added: “This MOU is an important step in the introduction of offshore wind in California, and we are very pleased to have reached this step with CC Power. As California and the nation rely increasingly on renewable energy to reach their climate goals, they urgently need first-mover information to guide the launch of offshore wind. The CADEMO project will provide this information roughly five years ahead of any larger-scale offshore wind development. This will help offshore wind gain greater public acceptance and will resolve many practical challenges to help launch our sector and create new California jobs”.

News item from CC Power

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