First offshore wind farm in U.S. could come to Delaware

Perhaps someday families will go on vacation in their electric-powered RVs to the coast of Delaware. Once there, parents will look out upon the water and say, "Kids, this is where offshore wind power came to the U.S." The kids won't listen - they'll be too busy with their hydrogen-powered toy cars (still the only affordable hydrogen vehicles) to care. Still, the parents will like arms and smile and think back to June 2008.

Why? Because yesterday, BlueWater Wind and Delmarva Power signed a deal to create North America's first offshore wind farm. Nothing is set in stone yet (there are backout clauses in the contract) but the $800m deal could power 50,000 homes - and their EVs - using 70 windmills off of Rehoboth Beach by 2012. According to ABG reader GoodCheer, who sent a tip in before anything was officially announced and seems to have the goods, these are the details:

-Delmarva Power will buy all production up to 200 MW @ 0.0968 / kW-h
-Farm size will be determined based on how many other customers BlueWater can drum up, up to a maximum of 600MW.
-Location will be 11.7-17.9 miles offshore, ENE of Rehoboth, DE.
-Proposed structure is monopile driven into the sand/gravel bottom (prehistoric flood-plane of the Delaware River), 30 m in.
-Turbine supplier TBD.

There's more at Delaware Online.

[Source: Delaware Online, GoodCheer]