An update to a story we told you about last week… an offshore wind energy project in Maine has received a key approval from state regulators. This article from CompositesWorld.com says the Maine Public Utilities Commission gave the go-ahead for the Maine Aqua Ventus project, a pilot offshore wind farm project designed to prove the feasibility of floating offshore wind turbines.

The Maine Public Utilities Commission approved a term sheet for the 12-MW Maine Aqua Ventus project proposed by Maine Prime Technologies, a spin-off of the University of Maine (Orono, Maine, USA) and two general partners, engineering firm Cianbro Corp. (Pittsfield, Maine) and energy services firm Emera Inc. (Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada).

Under the parameters of the term sheet, the project will produce about 43,000 MWh/year of energy at $0.23/kWh, with an annual increase of 2.5 percent per year for 20 years.

The approval by the commission now allows the Maine Aqua Ventus project to compete for $47 million in grant money from the U.S. Department of Energy.