Louisiana’s oil industry has been on the decline for decades, but could offshore wind farms give the state a way to replace that lost economic output and energy production? Renewable energy advocates say that’s the way forward, and are celebrating a Biden Administration move towards making it a reality.
The US Department of the Interior announced Wednesday that it will begin identifying offshore locations, including parts of the Gulf of Mexico, where future wind farm lease sales will be held. Director of the Alliance for Affordable Energy Logan Burke told WWL this opens a pathway to putting thousands of unemployed oil industry workers back in good-paying jobs.
“It’s absolutely necessary for the development of offshore wind, not just in the Gulf of Mexico, but around the country, to provide a path forward for those folks who are being left behind by a dying oil and gas industry,” said Burke.
Burke said the technology is there to make it happen right now, and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory claims wind power will be competitive within the next decade.
Professor Eric Smith with the Tulane Energy Institute told WWL only 40% of the Louisiana oil industry jobs that were lost to the pandemic have been recovered so far, and there’s real hesitance on the part of energy companies right now to invest capital in new exploration. Burke said those tens of thousands of highly skilled and hard-working, but out of a job Louisianans are perfect for this industry of the future.
“Pipefitters and steelworkers, various kinds of construction, the folks who fly the helicopters back and forth, the folks who manage the offshore rigs. Those kinds of jobs, including electricians, those are immediately transferable,” said Burke who warned, “If Louisiana doesn’t begin to think about offshore wind as an opportunity we will lose a lot of that expertise to states that are moving on this.”
Burke said the state must move quickly if it wants to be at the cutting edge of this rapidly developing industry because it can take ten years to get from the planning stages of a farm project to construction.
The biggest roadblock according to Burke? The high cost of connecting that new energy source to our existing grid.
