The developer of the nation’s first commercial-scale offshore wind farm installed the first steel foundation for the project off Rhode Island’s coast.
The Sunday installation of Deepwater Wind Block Island Wind Farm came just in time for a Monday tour of the site that will include Obama administration officials, lawmakers and Rhode Island’s governor, among others.
“It was a very big moment,” Jeffrey Grybowski, Chief Executive Officer of Deepwater Wind, toldthe Providence Journal shortly after watching the first foundation’s installation from a boat.
The company had hoped to install the foundation on Thursday, but the weather did not cooperate, the Journal reported.
The Block Island project will have five turbines, each with a capacity of six megawatts, when it is completed next year.
After repeated delays and setbacks at Cape Wind off nearby Massachusetts, the Block Island farm is set to become the first United States demonstration of offshore wind, which is far more prevalent in Europe and other places.
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