Fishermen Blast BOEM on Wind Area

by Laurie Schreiber

PORTLAND—At the New England Fishery Management Council’s (NEFMC) June meeting, members of NEFMC and the fishing industry expressed skepticism about proposed siting for a 127-square-mile (81,130 acres) offshore New York commercial wind energy leasing area.

Drew Minkiewicz, an attorney who represents the Fisheries Survival Fund (FSF), said FSF doesn’t oppose wind energy, but does oppose a site selection process performed without consultation with fishing interests in the area.

“This is the only one that was not done as part of a public process,” Minkiewicz said. “What this agency is trying to do in New York is give private companies the ability to have eminent domain and seize the ocean. Yes, they’ve met with the fishing industry, but they haven’t listened. They’re trying to steamroll the fishing industry. It is absolutely unconstitutional to give private entities eminent domain over a public resource. So this council can sit by and ask a few questions, or you can stand up for an industry you manage, and an area you manage, and talk about how this is a flawed process. Wind energy can and should happen—in a public process.”

Minkiewicz added, “We will fight this every step of the way. They can talk about all the meetings they’ve had, but you show no sign you’ve taken any of these comments into account.”

The proposed lease sale and Environmental Assessment were announced June 2 by the Department of Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM).

The Wind Energy Area (WEA) is 11 miles from Long Beach, N.Y. From its western edge, the area extends approximately 26 miles southeast at its longest portion.

The proposal evolved from an earlier one, in 2011, by the New York Power Authority (NYPA), Long Island Power Authority (LIPA), and Consolidated Edison, which together proposed an offshore wind power project south of Long Island, approximately 13 miles off Rockaway Peninsula. At that time, BOEM received an unsolicited request for a commercial lease from NYPA. The proposal included the installation of up to 194, 3.6 megawatt (MW) wind turbines, yielding a potential 700 MW of wind energy generation.

In 2013, BOEM issued a Request for Interest in the Federal Register to assess whether there were other parties interested in developing commercial wind facilities in the same area proposed by NYPA. BOEM received indications of interest from Fishermen’s Energy, LLC and Energy Management, Inc. So in 2014, BOEM published a “Call for Information and Nominations” to seek additional nominations from companies interested in commercial wind energy leases within the Call Area, as it’s termed.

BOEM then initiated the Area Identification stage of the leasing process, to identify areas for environmental analysis and consideration for leasing. This past June, BOEM published a “Proposed Sale Notice for Commercial Leasing for Wind Power on the Outer Continental Shelf Offshore New York” in the Federal Register, and began soliciting comments regarding the environmental assessment for the New York wind energy area.

The environmental assessment considers potential impacts associated with issuing a lease, including those from conducting surveys, and approving the installation of resource assessment facilities—specifically, a meteorological tower and/or buoys—in the area (www.boem.gov/New-York).

The assessment covers placement of a single meteorological tower anywhere within the entire lease site, BOEM’s Brian Hooker told NEMFC.

The issuance of a lease is only the initial step in the process, Hooker said. The lease permit doesn’t mean a developer can go ahead and develop the site; it only means the developer can submit a development plan to BOEM for construction and operation of a commercially viable facility. BOEM would issue an environmental impact statement for public review and comment at that time, Hooker said.

Hooker said that every proposed wind development area is evaluated on a case-by-case basis, with the consideration of placement of facilities to occur when a development plan is submitted.

BOEM completed the identification of the New York area as a lease site last November. The sale of the lease would occur at the end of 2016 at the earliest, Hooker said.

NEFMC members wanted to know if BOEM had negotiated directly with fishery interests in the area.

New York Wind Energy Area

“We had a series of public meetings, most recently in November, but there haven’t been any negotiations,” said Hooker. “Generally a negotiation would occur when there’s a developer identified and that developer might say, ‘This is what I want to build, this is what the market will bear, how can I do that and how will I potentially impact fisheries?’ That would occur after a developer is identified.” The selected developer would be required to hire a fishery liaison officer as part of that process, he said.

Leases are auctioned and lessees must subsequently undergo a review by the Department of Justice, Hooker said. Revenues from the auction go to the Department of Treasury, which also collects royalties and rents from the site.

“It’s not a sealed bid process but an open auction process,” said Hooker.

NEFMC members wanted to know if potential developers for these sites have any idea that there might be conflict with the fishing industry, and wanted to know if there would be any potential for compensation to the industry for lost revenue. They also wanted to know how the route of the transmission cable from the site to the mainland, is determined.

Hooker said bidders are notified in the proposed sale notice that there are potential conflicts with fishing. The route of the transmission cable would be included in the construction and operation plan.

NEFMC members wanted to know how much some of the lease sites are going for.

Hooker said recent provisional bids made by energy companies are $880,000 for a site off Delaware, and just over $1 million for an area off the northeast.

Hooker said that, while the environmental assessment offers a review of the fishing activity in the area, it doesn’t assess impacts of potential lease activity on fishing. That would come during the EIS process, he said.

FSF member Ron Smolowitz wanted to know if BOEM would continue its surveys of marine resources in the lease area throughout the construction process, in order to monitor for impacts.

“We don’t have specific projects planned, but we’re open to looking at that if we can coalesce around a set of priorities for those areas,” said Hooker.

“I think the process isn’t quite right,” said NEFMC member Mary Beth Tooley. “It appears you’ve taken shipping into consideration, but it also appears you haven’t taken fishing into account when identifying the site, and the industry doesn’t feel they’ve been consulted.”

Tooley continued, “For the government to accept money for an opportunity to apply for a lease in an area the government has defined—that sets up an adversarial role…It seems to be poor government process. It’s unfortunate you would end up in that place….And I think you’re going to hear a lot of that, probably in less-kind terms, when you get to New Bedford.”

NEFMC member David Pierce said the project doesn’t appear to be consistent with the goals of the Northeast Regional Ocean Planning process, which has set up a data and map portal that provides a great deal of information about ocean uses. The portal allows any potential ocean developer to examine potential impacts of their proposals.

“I listened to the Fisheries Survival Fund comments, and I really wonder to what extent has anyone yet, notably BOEM, been using that data portal,” said Pierce. “My comment would be, like Drew and others, that I’m concerned about the fact that it appears that fisheries data, notably regarding the location of the scallop resource, doesn’t appear to have been factored into planning for the site in New York…I think what BOEM is doing is inconsistent with the tone and tenor of this [regional ocean] plan. That’s the sense of my unease….And it might leave the sense with the public that perhaps, when all is said and done, different agencies will do whatever they want and not be sensitive to what the ocean plan is doing in providing background data.”

“The draft ocean plan is all about early identification of stakeholders and engagement with stakeholders before much gets written on paper,” agreed another NEFMC member. “I would stress that this becomes a major tenet that you can’t get this far down the road before you actually start talking with fishermen. By that time, so much money has been invested that everything is going to be a foregone conclusion. I’m hoping than whatever comes about in the new plan will fix this problem.”

Pierce and other NEFMC members said the scallop fishery will be most heavily impacted by the activity in the wind energy area.

“It appears that, although you’ve held the public sessions, issues by the fishing industry have not been addressed,” said NEFMC member Ellen Goethel. “I would expect at least a white paper or a press release stating the issues brought up at the hearings by the industry, and how you are going to address them.”

Meghan Lapp, with Seafreeze Ltd. in North Kingstown, R.I., expressed concern about the noise impact of pile driving on the area’s marine resources. Hooker said the environmental assessment for a single tower assesses that noise. But BOEM hasn’t yet reviewed potential noise impacts for a commercial scale project.

“It’s my opinion that a lot of comments for the industry have already been ignored,” said NEFMC member Eric Reid. “So any comments the council chooses to send to BOEM, we should send to the administration and to the congressional delegations of all the states of New England, so that somebody has to pay attention.”

Jeff Kaelin, with Lund’s Fisheries in Cape May, N.J., said that, from the marine transportation perspective, “This seems to be worst possible place. It’s right in middle of marine transportation going into New York City….It’s just crazy. I can’t imagine much time going by before that tower is run down by something going through there.”

The environmental assessment uses fisheries revenue data from 2007-2012 to estimate exposure of fishing revenue and spatial extent of federally managed fishing activity in the proposed lease area. The assessment concludes that impacts to commercial and recreational fisheries are minor. This takes into account impacts to fish, fish habitat, and vessel operations.

Species harvested from the NY Call Area include 0.8 percent of total sea scallop revenues from the Atlantic coast, 0.5 percent of total squid, mackerel and butterfish revenue from Atlantic coast, and 0.1 percent of total monkfish revenues; Atlantic herring; summer flounder, scup & black sea bass from the Atlantic coast.