Crowley spearheads offshore wind operations at Humboldt Bay

Jeffrey Andreini, Vice President, Crowley Wind Services said the company’s supply chain experiences with wind farm operations on the East Coast will help it accelerate Northern California operations at Humboldt Bay. 

Crowley announced in October of 2022 that it completed the purchase of 42 acres in Salem, Massachusetts, the latest milestone toward the development of the state’s second major offshore wind port terminal. The Salem Harbor Wind Terminal is a public-private partnership between Crowley and the City of Salem, with AVANGRID serving as the Port’s anchor tenant through its Commonwealth Wind and Park City Wind projects. The terminal will be a logistics and operations center for turbine pre-assembly, transportation, staging activities and storage of assembly components.

In opening up the new Crowley Wind Services’ Humboldt Bay office at Eureka, California on April 19th, Andreini told elected officials and maritime stakeholders that Crowley’s development of supply chain services for wind operations owes a great deal to the leadership of Thomas B. Crowley Jr. Crowley has served as Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board of Directors for Crowley Maritime since 1994: “Tom told me three years ago, ‘Jeff, I want our offshore wind business to be more than chartering tugs and barges.’ He has inspired us to be the leading supply chain provider for the offshore wind business in the United States. Without his mentoring, we would not be the leader that we are in this space.”

Scope of the Humboldt Wind Farm Project

Last November, Andreini spoke to AJOT and described the scope of the wind farm effort at Humboldt Bay: “I do not think that many people … realize the momentum that is building for offshore wind that is going to become evident in the second half of this decade. The opportunity in California affords us the ground floor opportunity for us to make a difference not just in California, but also on the U.S. West Coast to structure a supply chain and a workforce.”

If permits for the project are approved in 2024, then he expects “shovels in the ground thereafter and start-up middle of 2026. In 2026, you will be seeing a marshaling area where you will be seeing components. Vessels as well. Anchor handling vessels to tow the turbines out, the floating turbines. You will also be potentially seeing a manufacturing site, but I don’t want to get anybody’s hopes up as of yet. There will be tugs and barges transporting pre-assembled components. In addition, heavy lift ships will be used for the construction of the terminals. There will be heavy lift cranes that will … be doing the actual construction of the turbine. So, the terminal will do the construction of the floaters. The floaters will actually be built in Humboldt Bay and not in a foreign country. There might be materials that might come from Asia, but the pre-construction will potentially (take place) in either San Francisco or Los Angeles and would be shipped to Humboldt Bay where the actual buildout will take place.”

Andreini explained Crowley’s role: “Crowley will be responsible for hiring the stevedores and the crane companies that will do the actual construction of those turbines … These things are gigantic, they dwarf anything from a fixed component standpoint. The (wind turbine) towers are as high as 300 meters (nearly 1,000 feet)…”

Employment for the Project

As regards employment, Andreini said, “We’re looking at about 3,200 people. You’re going to need technicians, you’re going to need workers to work on the terminals, mariners working on the vessels themselves, stevedores. We have a relationship with Cal Poly Humboldt to begin that relationship regarding employment and also with Redwood Community College …. There’s going to have to be outreach, we are going to have to find the men and women to work because there are not enough people available. So how do you reach out to Sacramento and San Francisco to find workers to bring out to Eureka (in Humboldt County, California) to work in the program? You are talking about two different classes of workers, blue caller workers coming from Redwood Community College. Those are the people who will be running through a wielding program or carpentry program or the skills trades that will be needed. The mariners will be coming from California Maritime Academy in Vallejo. And then thirdly, the workers who are strong in the sciences and math and in the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) skills will be coming through Cal Poly Humboldt to work in tandem to be successful… We will also be using apprentice programs provided by the California Building Trades to provide qualified workers who have been trained in those apprenticeship programs.”

Andreini said that drug testing will be a hurdle to potential applicants: “We have not explored the drug testing issue but that may pose a problem in terms of being able to find qualified workers.”

Humboldt’s Wind Leadership

Andreini was followed by Larry Oetker, Executive Director, Humboldt Bay Harbor District, who said: “I was just in a meeting with (the ports of) San Diego, San Francisco, LA, Long Beach, and Oakland. We are a couple of years ahead of these ports and this will be enhanced by our relationship with Crowley.”

Oetker went on to explain: “Crowley is the leader in the development of offshore wind on the East Coast and they will bring their supply chain expertise to our region. We are looking towards a long-term relationship with Crowley. California has a goal of generating 25 gigawatts of wind power and Humboldt is poised to do half to two-thirds% of that wind power. I want to thank Jeff and Crowley. They challenged the Harbor District and the community of Humboldt to be better.”

Oetker told the audience that the Humboldt Bay Harbor District has focused on its relationship with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to provide “steady dredging in Humboldt Bay.”

This dredging will improve the infrastructure for offshore wind developers coming to Humboldt Bay.

Oetker told the audience that he is hopeful that permit approvals for the project will be completed by 2024 setting the stage for subsequent facility and wind turbine assembly and construction.

Oetker told AJOT that he expects that: “The EIR (Environmental Impact Report) will be released in the next two months just to regulatory agencies and not the public. The release of the EIR to the public will happen around November or December and then there will be three months before we start the hearing process on the EIR.”

Impact on Fishing

Oetker noted that one of many issues that need to be resolved is the impact of wind farm operations on local fishing. He said assembly and construction of wind turbines will compete in Humboldt Bay with space that has been utilized for fishermen and that there may be times when wind turbines are being floated out to sea that will block access for fishing boats entering and leaving the harbor.

Harrison Ibach, President, of Humboldt Fishermen’s Marketing Association, and Josh Mims, Del Norte Sea to Market Project Manager, told AJOT that they are concerned that wind farm developments will create more congestion in Humboldt Bay and complicate their efforts to fish in the Pacific Ocean at a time when both the crab and salmon seasons have been under considerable stress.

Ibach said: “The wind farm project is going to take up a lot of ground that we use for fishing. It’s a large area and a crucially important area.”

However, Ibach expressed the hope that fishing operations and wind farm operations could co-exist: “There is a middle ground here somewhere. We want to avoid impacts as much as possible and then minimize impacts as much as possible. Inevitably, there are going to be impacted. We’re going to have to find our middle where we can all work together.”