Republicans Tilt at Windmills as A-5651 Passes in the Assembly
Don Quixote has nothing on the GOP, whose members this afternoon unsuccessfully tried to stop A-5651, a corporate giveaway to the windfarm industry, by the reckoning of its critics, and an opportunity to pivot to alternative energy, according to its champions.
The vote was 44-31.
“This project will fuel 500,000 homes,” said Assemblyman John McKeon (D-27), who voted in favor of the bill.
“You will see these windmills out on the ocean as you’re sitting on the beach. People complain about dunes. …It is unbelievable that we allow a foreign company to damage our environment,” complained Assemblyman Erik Peterson (R-23).
Former NJ Sierra Club Director Jeff Tittel agreed.
“The Orsted bailout bill is a for-big-profits giant waste of money,” Tittel said.
As amended, A-5651 permits certain qualified offshore wind projects to retain certain federal tax benefits that were established after project approval. These federal tax benefits were established in order to bolster and support the offshore wind industry in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the unique macroeconomic challenges the pandemic posed.
The bill permits a qualified offshore wind project approved prior to July 1, 2019 to elect to retain certain incremental federal tax benefits. The bill defines “incremental federal tax benefit” to mean a federal tax credit, subsidy, grant, or other funding source that was established or increased after a qualified offshore wind project’s approval and, therefore, was not previously identified in the project’s awarded solicitation agreement. These incremental federal tax benefits primarily include tax benefits established pursuant to the federal “Taxpayer Certainty and Disaster Tax Relief Act of 2022,” the federal “Inflation Reduction Act of 2022,” and section 41 of the federal Internal Revenue Code of 1986.
For the calculation of each incremental federal tax benefit, the project’s total approved eligible costs are multiplied by the difference between the incremental federal tax benefit applicable to the project and the corresponding benefit identified in each qualified offshore wind project’s approved OREC pricing proposal. Additionally, each qualified offshore wind project is permitted to retain a portion of the federal tax credits received by the project, calculated by multiplying (1) the tax credit rate identified in the project’s approved pricing proposal by (2) the difference between the project’s total approved eligible costs and the project’s estimated costs at bid.
In addition to expressing other reasons why the bill doesn’t work, Republicans worry that the controversial tax break won’t necessarily benefit New Jersey workers.
Governor Phil KNUCKLEHEAD Murphy wants to build the 2nd biggest wind farm (4,000 turbines) off the coast of New Jersey. Can you imagine the visual pollution from the beaches on seeing these monstrosities??? New Jersey will lose a ton of tourism because nobody wants to come to the beach and see artificial wind turbines in their view. You won’t be able to take excursion boat trips up and down the coast, or go party-boat or charter-boat fishing. People will drive the extra few miles to go to Delaware’s Rehobeth Beach (which is a very nice beach), Virginia Beach and even North Carolina’s Outer Banks for their summer vacations.
The testing processes to begin building these wind turbines are already killing whales and will ultimately kill off the New Jersey recreational and commercial fishing grounds. You won’t be able to fish near the wind turbines without special permission, exorbitant permits, if at all. You will kill the NJ Lobster industry. And, you will kill a lot of birds that live on the coast and fish for their food where the turbines are located. They have a big problem in the West with wind turbines killing protected Bald Eagles and Golden Eagles, and other protected bird species.
Governor KNUCKLEHEAD is getting a huge payoff from the wind turbine company Orsted to build this ocean wind turbine farm.
Germany and Scandinavian countries are already starting to take down their ocean wind farms because they are not providing the electric power they claim to be able to provide. Sweden is eliminating it’s wind turbine farms and other “green energy” programs and going nuclear. Germany is firing up its only remaining nuke plant to compensate for lost energy from Russia and not enough “green energy” to provide heat for its people during the winter months.
The entire wind turbine farm project MUST BE KILLED NOW!!!!!!!!!!
As usual these liberal yoyos think that they know it all and use research selectively. Meanwhile we here in NJ will loose our beaches, which by the way are among the most popular in the country for family vacationers. No thought to the future and what happens when electricity is introduced to salt water. Ask any pleasure boater or commercial boat owner about “electrolisis” and how metals are eaten up from salt water. Hang on gang as this collections of fools seems to be getting thier way……again.