The first meeting of the Environmental resources offshore wind working group meeting was held this past Wednesday evening. In attendance, in addition to myself representing recreational fishing interests, was a very interesting mix of user groups with the majority being members or those voicing concerns of the commercial fishing community, especially those having specific interest due to the nature of the bottom trawling gear they utilize. There were also several environmental organizations present in addition to many DEP staffers, including Commissioner McCabe and deputies Bukowski and Mans and marine fisheries lead Joe Cemino.
Notably, there were members of the US Coast Guard present and this was a refreshing sight. I have been to every single meeting to date (BOEM & BPU) and they have been noticeably absent. The coast guard plays an important role in this project as the wind farms will interface with a myriad of user groups and has the unique ability to respond to certain maritime issues as they come up. There were also representatives from Sen. Menendez and Cong. Pallone’s office along with someone from NOAA and BOEM and NJ’s own Economic development and board of public utilities.
The meeting was held at the Jacques Cousteau National Research Reserve in Tuckerton from 5pm until 7pm. The agenda was set to cover the state of fisheries, offshore wind discussion, overview of the working group, review of the OSW timeline and BPU’s role in it all. Next, we spent time identifying key issues and concerns and wrapped it all up with a review of the next steps to be taken and set a January meeting for the next session.
My takeaway from the meeting was that this was a good start, but NJ is a bit late to the game and needs to step it up quickly. We clearly need to partner with the states in New England that are about a year ahead of NJ instead of reinventing the wheel. The offshore wind topic is a very deep one and is going to need A LOT of time and effort to deal with. There’s 9 million people in Jersey and barely a handful even realize the extent of the what is going down right in the middle of it all. Imagine if we were building another Jersey Turnpike in less than 4 years! Already, there is well over a billion dollars on the line in addition to hundreds of companies in the supply chain, thousands of workers and enormous ships for the next decade and beyond.
There are so many aspects of this project ranging from maritime port concerns to Horseshoe crabs and everything in between. I strongly encourage members of JCAA affiliated clubs to assign a person to engage and become active in this massive undertaking. There are going to be many opportunities for public comment and interaction on various levels. The underlying theme of the entire meeting was that the clock is ticking loud, moving quickly and we are going to have steel in the water and blades spinning by 2024!
This is a call to action. We MUST engage early in the planning process and make sure that the project is done responsibly to avoid future conflicts.
