Avangrid delays commissioning of Park City, Commonwealth wind projects

Avangrid Renewables LLC has pushed back the planned completion deadlines for its 800-MW Park City and 1,232-MW Commonwealth wind projects off the coast of Massachusetts by a year due to the current economic environment.

The unit of Avangrid Inc (NYSE:AGR), which is in turn part of Spanish utility group Iberdrola SA (BME:IBE), said on Wednesday that the Park City Wind complex will be commissioned in 2027, instead of 2026, while the Commonwealth Wind park is now planned to reach commercial operations in 2028, rather than in 2027.

The delay aims to mitigate potential supply chain bottlenecks and high commodity prices, the company explained. Both projects are currently undergoing federal permitting process.

The Park City project was awarded a contract to supply clean power to Connecticut in 2019. The Commonwealth scheme, meanwhile, was selected as part of Massachusetts’ third offshore wind competitive procurement process in December 2021.

Last week, Avangrid filed a motion with the Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities (DPU) to suspend for a month the review of Commonwealth Wind’s power purchase agreements (PPAs), seeking time to evaluate the economic challenges and assess measures that would bring the project back to economic viability.

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