The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) released its Offshore Wind Energy Strategy, which targets deploying 30 GW of offshore wind projects by 2030 while spurring $12 billion per year in direct private investment.

Deploying the offshore wind capacity would provide enough power for 10 million homes and support 77,000 jobs. These efforts will lead the US to achieve 110 GW or more offshore wind energy by 2050.

The department-wide strategy outlines how the government would accelerate the deployment of offshore wind to achieve a carbon-free electricity sector by 2035.

U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm said, “Our Offshore Wind Energy Strategy shows that we’re leveraging all resources across our department to harness this clean and reliable American energy source, which will create tens of thousands of good-paying, union jobs and revitalize coastal communities.”

The strategy categorizes DOE’s offshore wind efforts into four pillars:

• Lower costs from $73/ MWh to $51/ MWh by 2030, develop a domestic supply chain and inform sustainable, just deployment of fixed-bottom offshore wind.
• Achieve the floating offshore wind shot goal of reducing cost by over 70% to $45/ MWh by 2035, establish U.S. leadership in floating offshore wind design and manufacturing, and inform sustainable and just deployment of floating offshore wind.
• Enable reliable and resilient transmission solutions for large-scale offshore wind deployment.
• Expand offshore wind co-generation technologies for widespread electrification and decarbonization.

The department plans to leverage its various offices’ expertise, capabilities, and resources, including the Office of Electricity, Office of Manufacturing and Energy Supply Chains, and Wind Energy Technologies Office, to promote offshore wind energy.

The strategy includes multiple focus areas, such as R&D to reduce costs, sustainable deployment, transmission research, stakeholder engagement, and supply chain development. Each office will contribute to one or more critical areas to facilitate offshore wind energy deployment.

Last October, the U.S. government said it would hold a lease sale for areas off the West Coast for wind projects critical to achieving the administration’s offshore wind energy goals of 30 GW by 2030 and a floating offshore wind energy target of 15 GW by 2035.

According to the U.S. National Renewable Energy Laboratory, the country needs to deploy 70–150 GW of wind energy and 40–90 GW of solar every year until 2030 to decarbonize America’s power sector by 2035.