Three years after they began, negotiations over a proposed power contract for an offshore floating wind farm in the Gulf of Maine have come to an abrupt halt, with the developer citing “recent shifts in the energy landscape that have in particular caused uncertainty in the offshore wind industry.”

In a March 28 filing at the Public Utilities Commission, the PUC staff explained that Pine Tree Offshore Wind LLC has requested that the talks be temporarily suspended.

The request is not a total surprise, due to rising material costs worldwide and efforts by President Donald Trump to dismantle the nascent domestic industry. But it still represents a blow to Maine’s long-term efforts to position floating offshore wind as a major new source of clean energy and economic development.

Dan Burgess, director of the Governor’s Energy Office, said in an emailed statement that the office “understands and respects Pine Tree Offshore Wind’s request to pause negotiations for the state’s research array, in reflection of current uncertainty in the offshore wind industry.

Offshore wind, including the research array, is an important part of Maine’s long-term energy future, and GEO will continue to work on responsible offshore wind research and development to advance economic and environmental benefits for Maine.” 

When asked specifically why it was putting talks on hold, Pine Tree Offshore Wind declined to comment and referred questions to the GEO.

Maine must deploy and test full-size versions of this platform design far offshore, in a so-called research array. After three years of negotiations, state regulators had been planning to decide by late March if a proposed contract for utilities to buy power from a 12-platform wind farm was in the public interest.

The proposed research array, 30 miles off Portland, was expected to be a critical stepping stone to a commercial-scale wind farm in the Gulf of Maine.

Maine is playing a long game on offshore wind. But its standing with global investors and developers could hinge on what happens with the test hull and research array contract over the next year or so.

Without the contract, Maine will lose its best chance to compete in floating offshore wind, according to Chris Wissemann, chief executive officer of Diamond Offshore Wind, which plans to build the array. Diamond is a subsidiary of Japan’s Mitsubishi Corp., and is part of related subsidiaries called New England Aqua Ventus LLC and Pine Tree Offshore Wind LLC. Diamond has invested $20 million so far pursuing that goal, he said.

“If the research array is not approved early this year,” Wissemann told The Maine Monitor last January, “Maine’s leadership in offshore wind is lost, I believe, probably forever. The industry will conclude that Maine won’t do anything. Too much time has gone on.”

Maine is not the only state facing headwinds on offshore wind development. Utility companies in Rhode Island and Massachusetts also announced this week that they would delay contract negotiations amidst federal uncertainty.

“This is a reaction to the uncertainty and hostility that’s coming from the federal government,” said Jack Shapiro, climate and clean energy director for the Natural Resources Council of Maine. “Nobody knows if they’re going to get any kind of permit at all.”

For supporters of offshore wind energy, the discouraging news regarding the research array contract was offset somewhat this week, following news that the University of Maine on Sunday had launched a second prototype of its patented floating wind turbine platform. Researchers put the 52-foot wide, quarter scale hull in the water at Bar Harbor, the Bangor Daily News reported. The platform will be towed to a test site off Castine.

It has been 12 years since UMaine tested a one-eighth scale version of the platform at the same location. Since then, the UMaine team has worked to refine the 380-ton concrete, semi-submersible design, which would be built at full scale when a 12-turbine research array is finally developed, now planned for sometime in the 2030s.

This story was originally published by The Maine Monitor, a nonprofit civic news organization. To get regular coverage from The Monitor, sign up for a free Monitor newsletter here.