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Like a bolt out of the blue, the US agency Hecate Vitality reached out and tapped the Bureau of Ocean Vitality Administration final week, requesting the best to develop two federal offshore wind vitality areas assigned to Texas. The shock transfer was, effectively, shocking. BOEM has been making an attempt, and failing, to solicit curiosity in different Texas-based offshore lease areas for the previous two years. Nevertheless, the state’s rising inexperienced hydrogen business could have one thing to do with the sudden spurt of curiosity.
No Takers For Texas Offshore Wind Leases…
Earlier than attending to the inexperienced hydrogen angle, let’s check out the large image of offshore wind sources within the Gulf of Mexico.
Regardless of comparatively sluggish wind speeds among the many 5 Gulf Coast states — Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida — the Vitality Division’s Nationwide Renewable Vitality Laboratory issued a pair of reviews again in 2020 that drew an optimistic image for creating wind sources within the Gulf of Mexico.
The BOEM-funded reviews had been aimed toward figuring out the outlook for numerous sorts of offshore renewable vitality improvement among the many 5 states.
“NREL lists the Gulf’s shallow water, lower average wave heights, and existing oil and gas infrastructure on the positive side for developing all sorts of ocean energy, including tides and currents, thermal conversion, wave power, and hydrogen conversion in addition to wind turbines,” CleanTechnica famous on the time.
Offshore wind got here out far forward of different sources, weighing in with the potential for 508 gigawatts — totally twice the electrical energy demand of all 5 Gulf states mixed.
Sadly, when it got here time to place up or shut up, no person needed to get their toes moist. Final 12 months, BOEM put the primary two Texas-based federal offshore lease areas up for bid, and no person bit. The 2 designated areas, Galveston 1 and a pair of, had been a part of the I, J, and Ok federal offshore areas with close by entry to the essential Port of Houston.
BOEM tried to public sale two elements of the identical offshore areas within the Galveston-Houston in March of final 12 months, although an official assertion of opposition from Texas Land Commissioner Daybreak Buckingham put a damper on the hassle. After receiving only one certified expression of curiosity, BOEM canceled the public sale on July 26.
For the file, Buckingham acknowledged that “I will never allow the federal government to endanger the people of Texas and our state’s beautiful wildlife with untested, unproven, and ineffective technology when reliable, clean, and safe energy is already available,” having apparently forgotten all in regards to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon spill within the Gulf of Mexico, the 2014 oil barge spill in Galveston Bay, and the brand new oil slick at present lurking about eight miles off the coast of Texas, to call a couple of.
…Till The Goddess Of Witchcraft Steps In
Hecate (pronounced HEK-uh-tee) might be translated as “worker from afar,” which is a reasonably poetic means of describing wind vitality or, for that matter, witchcraft. Placing the witchcraft angle apart in the intervening time, the US agency Hecate explains that the crossroads of earth, sea, and sky are the area of the Greek goddess Hecate. “Our name reflects our mission of developing power generation resources at the crossroads of traditional and emerging technologies,” the corporate states.
Apparently Hecate sees one thing within the Texas offshore areas that others haven’t seen. As an alternative of specializing in the Houston-Galveston market, final week Hecate requested a federal lease for wind areas C and D, that are situated farther to the south, off the coast of Corpus Christi. That triggered a few responses from BOEM, together with cancellation of the March offshore lease public sale.
BOEM introduced the cancellation in a press launch dated July 26. In the identical launch, the workplace famous that it will possibly’t simply merely hand over the Corpus Christi lease areas to to Hecate. First, BOEM has to achieve out and see if anybody else is .
“If BOEM receives one or more indications of interest in acquiring a commercial wind lease from qualified entities, BOEM may decide to move forward with a competitive lease sale. If BOEM does not receive competing indications of interest from qualified companies, BOEM may move forward with a noncompetitive lease issuance to Hecate Energy,” BOEM defined.
One thing Is Brewing Between Offshore Wind & Inexperienced Hydrogen
The massive query is, why Corpus Christi? I’ll attain out to Hecate for a solution, and within the meantime it’s enjoyable to guess why Corpus Christi.
The Port of Houston likes to remind everybody that it’s the nation’s main seaport by way of tonnage, however the Port of Corpus Christi lays declare to the largest vitality export gateway within the US, in addition to the third-biggest port for oil export on the earth, so there’s that.
Extra to the purpose, final 12 months the Port of Corpus Christi threw its hat into the $7 billion Regional Clear Hydrogen Hub ring, a hydrogen-promoting program of the US Division of Vitality funded by means of the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Legislation. The primary focus is on extracting hydrogen from renewable sources, however the BIL stipulated a carve-out for fossil vitality sources. That was mirrored within the Corpus Christi proposal, which emphasised various hydrogen feedstocks in addition to the Port’s standing because the “most efficient ship channel on the U.S. Gulf Coast.”
Corpus Christi ultimately misplaced out to a different hydrogen hub proposal centered in Houston, however Hecate’s offshore wind request signifies that hydrogen stakeholders round Corpus Christi are nonetheless energetic, maybe with an eye fixed on extracting inexperienced hydrogen from water with {an electrical} present. Wind vitality has a specific benefit in that regard, since it may be deployed for water electrolysis throughout off-peak hours at evening.
Hydrogen hub or not, the Texas inexperienced hydrogen business is constant to draw substantial curiosity. One instance is the large Hydrogen Metropolis venture beneath the wind of the Texas startup Inexperienced Hydrogen Worldwide. The agency is relying on each wind and photo voltaic vitality, domestically sourced in southeast Texas, to energy its electrolyzers.
As of this writing, GHI’s renewable vitality wishlist specifies onshore wind, however one other Texas startup, Offshore Wind Energy Techniques of Texas, is positioning itself to stage up the entire offshore wind / inexperienced hydrogen connection.
The corporate has leveraged offshore oil and fuel know-how to give you a hurricane-resistant offshore wind turbine platform it calls TITAN. Initially scaled to 12 megawatts, the platform will ultimately assist 15-30 megawatts of offshore wind.
OWPST states that its platform is designed to supply zero emission electrical energy and desalinated, de-ionized seawater for onshore electrolysis techniques. It might additionally assist electrolysis techniques at sea, although that is still to be seen. Both means, the corporate notes that brine from the desalination system might be processed for additional use within the agriculture and pharmaceutical industries.
We’re about to seek out out if it’s all true. OWPST is at present working with the German agency Vedomi Fueling GmbH and the Scottish Improvement Enterprise Group to deploy its TITAN offshore wind platform for a 1200 ton-per-day inexperienced hydrogen venture.
With Commissioner Buckingham’s objections to offshore wind improvement looming overhead, it’s no shock to see this explicit offshore wind venture taking form elsewhere, specifically off the coast of Scotland. Maybe Hecate can have higher luck right here at residence, so keep tuned for updates.
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Picture (screenshot): The US agency Hecate Vitality is making a shock transfer into the difficult waters of the Texas offshore wind vitality business, with a request to lease two offshore areas close to the Port of Corpus Christi (courtesy of Hecate Vitality).
