well despite hitting a number of hurdles State officials are letting the offshore wind industry know New Jersey is open for business the Board of Public Utilities today opened up a fourth round of bidding for new wind farms but the push comes as the Murphy Administration trades blows with a group of jerseyshore Mayors who don't want to see turbines filling up the ocean senior correspondent Brenda Flanagan reports we are committed to seeing the economic development that offshore is bringing to New Jersey New Jersey Regulators today officially opened a fourth round of bids for new offshore wind projects which could add from 1.2 to four GW of clean energy to New Jersey's portfolio but the vote came amidst a whirlwind of regional challenges confronting the fledgling industry certainly offshore wind is really at an inflection point right now industry analyst Chris olith says three New York projects recently collapsed due to supply chain and inflation problems they're up for rebids meanwhile New Jersey's Atlantic Shores reportedly may ask to rebid its wind farm contract it's a volatile Marketplace and if we are going to build offshore wind in a responsible and costeffective manner then we need to have protections for the state of New Jersey there's a lot of interesting opportunities and a lot of potential competition which I think is really what the state wants what we want as rate payers what governor Murphy wants is for New Jersey to develop 11 gaw of offshore wind power by 2040 but that's a much tougher Target after developer orad cancelled Jersey's first two Wind Farm projects last October to compensate the Board of Public Utilities has sped up requests for bids and this fourth solicitation bakes in some extra protections like a $50,000 per megawatt security fee and another $100 million performance guarantee there's an additional $100 million letter of credit for any potential rebids and that's all to ensure the um project completion we see it as incentives to ensure that the projects are staying on track as the saying goes once bitten twice shy Atlantic Shores did not respond to requests for comment on a possible rebid it's a contentious topic for eight Mayors along New Jersey's Coast including all of Long Beach Island I have never heard nor have any of the other t ever heard of why they're allowing somebody to come back and rebid Long Beach townships Jim Mancini and the other mayor sent the BPU a letter citing their Consultants report it projects Atlantic Shores 157 turbines about 9 miles offshore could cost the town $668 million in Lost tourism jobs and tax dollars and also claims a project rebid could eventually Elevate rate payer costs by more than 6 billion billion dollars they should have issued specific performance on the existing contract and go from there but it's not going to be profitable because this stuff doesn't work again can't speculate on any specific projects or bids um but we will move forward with a competitive process and evaluate all the all the bids in the best interest of New Jersey residents the BPU in January approved to additional New Jersey wind farms attentive and Leading Light but they're still months away from getting required permits and won't come online until the 2030s federal officials do plan to streamline regulations to ease the application process the fourth round of New Jersey bids are due July 10th I'm Brenda Flanagan NJ Spotlight news [Music]