Navigating Regulatory Uncertainties and Understanding Permit Conditions

DNV has extensively reviewed and evaluated survey and reporting requirements, proposed and implemented design modifications, and construction or operational stipulations associated with offshore wind projects (confidential) along the east coast of the United States (U.S.).

By collecting and reviewing individual project data and risks, our team has been able to conduct comparative analysie, identifying trends which can inform future project planning and development within the east coast Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM)-designated Regions of New England, New York Bight/Mid-Atlantic, and Central Atlantic.

The current phase of federal permit approval (i.e., Draft or Final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) or Record of Decision (ROD)) for each project aids in understanding and identifying sequential permit conditions, general trends, or changes to the overall project risks. DNV has also quantified project risk in terms of schedule and budget.

Anticipated project risks

  • Impacts to schedule and technical parameters: 
    The length of permitting process has the greatest variability and largely depended on the individual projects impact considerations and proposed mitigation measures. During BOEM environmental and technical review, all projects reviewed required some level of modification to the proposed design parameters. This most commonly resulted in a reduction of the cable routing distance, number of offshore substations, or wind turbine positions. 
    Changes to the proposed Project Design Envelope (PDE) result in rework of plans and specifications, as well as the permitting documentation. This impacts project schedule and budget. Additional difficulties associated with scheduling of construction activities can easily be amplified when working around numerous offshore and nearshore time of year restrictions (i.e., species migrations or similar environmental factors).
  • Increasing requirements and evolving guidelines: 
    The number of guidance documents or plans that need to be implemented by the individual projects has generally continued to increase as each new project is proposed for development. Further, leading federal agencies – including BOEM and the U.S. Coast Guard - are continually developing new guidelines or compliance requirements. Examples include the BOEM Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (PEIS), and mitigation plans such as the BOEM-National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) collaborative North Atlantic Right Whale (NARW) strategy. 
    Adherence to the measures proposed in these documents is necessary to properly plan for project compliance during subsequent development phases. Draft regulations, which are not fully developed or available at this time, pose some level of risk. The need for projects to wait on an agency to develop, approve, and release such guidelines and practices to be followed also presents risk to the project schedule and cost.

Trends summary

Beyond establishing a baseline of “risk” for offshore wind developments along the U.S. east coast, DNV has been able to identify the most likely conditions to be imposed on projects once the BOEM ROD is issued.  

Understanding construction and compliance requirements and establishing proper protocols and tracking mechanisms from each of the individual permits received by a project is essential. Further, this risk-based information can be interpreted to compare not only the individual projects but inform on what permit approvals or requirements are likely to be most stringent for future projects within the various BOEM Regions or to individual states.

Risk distribution
Risk distribution across project scope Items (Millions of USD)

 

Permitting Trends
Permitting Trends: Conditions of Approval

 

Comparison discussion

  • Generally, DNV identified a higher number of conditions and requirements associated with marine mammals within northern (New England and New York Bight/Mid-Atlantic) lease areas, while mitigations in the Central Atlantic appear to be more heavily associated with navigational safety, transport, and national security
  • Tribal and local community stakeholder involvement and concern has led to increased risk associated with these elements of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process (public outreach, public comment periods). Specific examples include anticipated visual impacts on wildlife refuge, fishing areas, and disputes over traditional cultural property status.

Relevance to upcoming auctions

Gulf of Maine: Impacts to fishing and local community groups/stakeholders, and more time-of-year restrictions or mitigations for impacted onshore industries, are likely. More uncertainty, and potential increase in design modifications due to implementation of the new, emerging floating offshore wind technologies.

Central Atlantic: Projects within the Central Atlantic are anticipated to have more conditions associated with cultural and archeological resources and mitigating Tribal stakeholder impacts. DNV also noted that the Central Atlantic projects have more compensatory mitigation fund requirements than other projects, which increased the projects’ financial risk.

Additional resources

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