ATLANTIC CITY — Governor Phil Murphy signed an executive order Wednesday to return the state to national leadership in offshore wind energy.
New Jersey will finally implement the Offshore Wind Economic Development Act of 2010, which languished under Gov. Chris Christie, Murphy said at a press conference at the Atlantic County Utilities Authority’s wind farm and wastewater treatment plant.
The law creates ratepayer-financing of wind field development through an Offshore Wind Renewable Energy Credit program. But Christie’s administration never finalized regulations to implement it, and developers have not received the approvals from the Board of Public Utilities to move forward, Murphy said.
The order commits the state to quickly generate 1,100 megawatts annually of offshore wind energy, and 3,500 megawatts of generation by the year 2030 — enough to power 1.5 million homes, according to Murphy.
“Thirty-five hundred megawatts would make us, I think, the number one aspirational wind field in the world,” Murphy said. Scale, reliability and predictability will make it possible to attract manufacturing, the governor said.
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The order sends a clear message that New Jersey is serious about being the greenest state in the country, while creating good-paying, clean-energy jobs, said Ed Potosnak, executive director of the New Jersey League of Conservation Voters.
“It’s hard to think of a more appropriate location than Atlantic City for this announcement — a city that is both on the frontlines of climate change and brimming with economic potential,” Potosnak said.
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