As the United States seeks ways to meet the ever-increasing power needs of its large coastal population areas, there’s a growing focus on the plentiful renewable energy resources located just offshore.

In their new book, energy experts Markian Melnyk and Robert Andersen outline the important new offshore options available to a nation on the threshold of a green revolution. The experience gained by early offshore oil and gas prospectors, as well as by more recent developers of European offshore wind, wave, and tidal energy projects, provide a wealth of knowledge that can be readily transferred to North American marine energy projects.

Whether you’re a developer, financial backer, or regulator, Offshore Power charts a course for long-term deployment of marine renewable energy facilities, and creates a compelling picture of a greener future.

Contents

• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Acronyms and abbreviations
• Stepping off dry land: The case for offshore renewable energy
• An unfamiliar environment: Offshore conditions and energy resources
• Marvelous machines: Harvesting nature's offshore energy crop
• Carving out a piece of the shelf: Project siting decisions
• Acquiring rights to project sites: MMS and offshore renewables; FERC and hydrokinetics
• Action and its impacts: Project review under the National Environmental Policy Act
• Nature and machine coexisting offshore: Federal protections for natural and cultural resources
• Still more permits: The roles of other federal and state agencies reviewing proposed offshore projects
• Renewable energy goodwill: Managing the public consultation process
• Connecting to the grid: Adapting to intermittent renewable energy supplies
• Working the numbers: Financing and insuring offshore renewable energy projects
• Cultivating disruptive change: The economic challenge of offshore renewable energy
• Notes
• Index
• About the authors