By Ted Nesi

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) - Executives at the renewable-energy firm Deepwater Wind don’t see any logic in critics’ efforts to link it with 38 Studios because the wind company is relying on private investors to finance its project and is being closely scrutinized by regulators.

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• Related: Q&A: How the Deepwater Wind-National Grid deal works (Aug. 11, 2010)

(rendering: Deepwater Wind)

Advocates of renewable-energy projects often emphasize that one of the benefits will be an increase in manufacturing jobs for states like Rhode Island.

So it’s a little depressing to see that a Rhode Island company doing a project in Providence funded by a state agency has picked a Chinese firm to build wind turbines in North Dakota. PBN reports:

Gilbane Building Co., the firm overseeing the construction of wind turbines at a Providence wastewater treatment plant, has selected Goldwind USA to provide the three turbines for the project.

Goldwind USA, a subsidiary of China’s Xinjiang Goldwind Science and Technology Co., said on Monday it will provide three 1.5 megawatt permanent magnet direct-drive turbines, each with 82-meter rotors on 70-meter towers. The turbines’ blades will be manufactured at LM Wind Power’s Grand Forks, N.D., plant.

The turbines will be constructed at the Field’s Point Wastewater Treatment Facility; Gilbane won a $12.2 million contract to oversee the project in September from the Narragansett Bay Commission.

In fairness, I’m not sure there is a manufacturer here in Rhode Island that could make the blades Gilbane and the commission need. But considering Rhode Island’s 11% unemployment rate is more than triple North Dakota’s 3.6%, it seems unfortunate.

Deepwater Wind announced today that it is doubling the proposed size of its larger offshore wind farm to 200 turbines. The expanded project – which is different from Deepwater’s small pilot wind farm planned off Block Island – could generate up to 1,000 megawatts of electricity about 18 miles off Rhode Island’s coast. The Providence Journal’s Alex Kuffner offered a thorough rundown of the latest iteration in today’s paper, and I recommend his article.

This morning I called Matt Kaplan, an associate director at the Cambridge consultancy IHS Emerging Energy Research who covers the North American wind energy industry. I asked him for his take on Deepwater’s announcement, what challenges the company faces in moving forward, and how this fits into the broader offshore wind picture here in New England (think Cape Wind). Here’s a transcript of our conversation, lightly edited for clarity.

What’s your take on Deepwater Wind’s big announcement today?

The project itself is of a very large scale – 1,000 megawatts would put it up there as one of the largest proposed offshore wind projects in the U.S. So it’s a very ambitious and aggressive announcement, especially in light of some of the challenges that offshore wind has faced in the past couple of years, and that includes the permitting process, which has traditionally been a challenge, as well as making project economics work.

(more…)

D.E. Shaw, the huge New York hedge fund paying for Deepwater Wind’s efforts to build two wind farms off Rhode Island, has run into financial problems and is now reviewing its investments. My story is up on WPRI.com:

The New York hedge fund backing Deepwater Wind, the company picked to build two wind farms off Rhode Island, has run into financial problems just as the project faces a court challenge.

D.E. Shaw & Co. fired 10 percent of its work force, or 150 people, to deal with a 46 percent plunge in the value of its assets, Bloomberg News and other outlets reported Tuesday. The fund’s holdings fell to $21 billion as of Sept. 1, Bloomberg said.

D.E. Shaw is also conducting a strategic review of its investments and operations, according to the Financial Times. The fund had sunk “tens of millions of dollars” into Deepwater Wind as of June, a company executive told The Block Island Times .

An exclusive WPRI 12 poll set for release tonight shows the Deepwater project is popular with Rhode Islanders, with 56 percent of likely voters saying they would be willing to pay an additional $1.35 to $3 per month for electricity to support it. Only 32 percent opposed doing so, and 12 percent were not sure.

No word on what impact – if any – this could have on the company’s projects here, which are already facing a court challenge expected to stretch into next year.

Jeff Grybowski

Jeff Grybowski, who served in the Carcieri administration from 2003 to 2007 including 10 months as the governor’s chief of staff, has joined Deepwater Wind as its chief administrative officer and senior vice president for strategy and external affairs, the company said today.

Deepwater, of course, is the hedge fund-backed wind power company picked by Carcieri in September 2008 to develop two offshore wind farms with the state’s enthusiastic (but non-financial) support. Bill Lynch, now a candidate for Congress, criticized Grybowski’s involvement with Deepwater back in 2008 when he was head of the R.I. Democratic Party. It will be interesting to see if he or his brother, Attorney General Patrick Lynch – another Deepwater critic – will sound off on Grybowski’s hiring.

Deepwater also announced that it is now officially a Rhode Island company, with its Providence office serving as its corporate headquarters; before, the HQ had been in Hoboken, N.J., near the New York City base of the company’s chief financial backer, D. E. Shaw. The Hoboken office remains open. No sign of the press release on Deepwater’s website yet.

On a related note, all this news comes the same day Carcieri co-wrote an op-ed in Politico calling on Congress to approve a federal Renewable Electricity Standard.

Update: No mention of Grybowski’s hiring in a Carcieri press release issued moments ago praising Deepwater’s decision to make Providence its corporate home. “This decision by Deepwater Wind to relocate its corporate headquarters to Rhode Island is further proof of the company’s commitment to help us develop the nation’s first offshore wind farm and create good paying jobs for Rhode Islanders,” the governor said. (Carcieri also put Grybowski on the Judicial Nominating Commission last year.)

Update #2: Checked in with a Deepwater spokeswoman to double-check on what the corporate headquarters relocation really means. The company’s senior management team will indeed by based here in Providence, while the Hoboken office will be “a development office only,” she said.

(image credit: Hinckley Allen Snyder LLP)