First offshore wind turbine installed in US

UNITED STATES: America's first commercial offshore wind turbine has been installed at Deepwater Wind's 30MW Block Island project.

The US has installed its first offshore wind turbine

Installation of the first 6MW GE Haliade turbine was completed at 08.30 local time (13:30 UK time), . 

The nacelles were shipped from GE's Saint-Nazaire facility last month and arrived in Rhode Island, northeast US . 

A total of five turbines will be installed 26km off the US mainland by Fred Olsen Windcarrier's Brave Tern jack-up vessel. 

The jacket foundations were installed over the summer of 2015. 

Montco Offshore

The project will provide electricity to more than 1,000 inhabitants of the 25-square-kilometre Block Island, which currently ferries in a million gallons (4.5 million litres) a year of pricey, dirty diesel.

— Jeff Grybowski (@JGrybowski)

Offshore wind is beginning to gather pace in the US. The Bureau of Ocean Management has auctioned approximately nine zones for offshore wind development, with a tenth off the coast of expected before the end of 2016. 

At the start of August, nearby Massachusetts passed a bill requiring local utilities to buy power from up to by July 2027.