IBEW-Made
Maine Screenprinter Goes Union With the IBEW

Help Protect Workers
Where You Buy
Makes a Difference

A Local of Their Own
TVA Nuclear Security Officers Vote to
Join the IBEW

North of 49°
IBEW Initiative Boosts Already Strong Canadian Diversity Efforts

Au nord du 49° parallèle
L'initiative sur la diversité de la FIOE mise sur la réussite du Canada

IEC Minutes
February 2020

The Energy Future
Will Be Union-Built
New Jersey's Plan to Become
the 'Houston of Offshore Wind'

Hundreds of IBEW members could be working as early as next spring on construction of the New Jersey Wind Port, a massive project that has union leaders hopeful about the potential for decades of long-term renewable energy jobs for members of the IBEW and other union trades.

"This project announcement could not have come at a better time considering the uncertainty of future construction due to COVID-19," said Folsom, N.J., Local 351 Business Manager Dan Cosner, whose South Jersey jurisdiction covers the wind port's planned Salem County location at the mouth of the Delaware River.

In June, Garden State Gov. Phil Murphy announced plans for the 200-acre, $400 million production and assembly facility to be built in Lower Alloways Creek, where he believes it will serve as a major first step toward making his state a nerve center for the offshore wind projects slated for construction along the U.S. Atlantic Coast over the next decade.

"Wind generation discussions in New Jersey have been going on for 10 to 15 years," Cosner said. "Gov. Murphy has been pushing green energy a long time, and he jumpstarted the talks over the last three or four years to make it a reality here."

Right now, almost all utility-scale wind power generation in the U.S. and Canada is land-based, supplementing traditional and reliable baseload power sources such as nuclear and coal. But Murphy hopes the wind port will reveal the potential of offshore wind and help New Jersey dominate the wind energy field — much like oil made Texas king of that industry in the last century.

"Somebody's going to get to be the Houston of American offshore wind," quipped Tim Sullivan, chief executive of the New Jersey Economic Development Authority, in an interview with The Washington Post.

When the wind port's initial work is complete, the facility will support at least nine offshore generation projects planned by Denmark-based Orsted. "They're the guys, the movers and shakers," Cosner said.

The IBEW has worked with Orsted before. Providence, R.I., Local 99 members were instrumental in getting the company to build the U.S.'s first — and, so far, only — offshore utility-scale wind farm on Block Island, about 13 miles off Rhode Island's shore. The project's five turbines became operational in 2016.

"Future offshore wind farm projects can leverage what the IBEW learned in Rhode Island and expand on it," said Third District International Vice President Mike Welsh.

Stephenson:
A Seat at the Table
Cooper:
Organize Every Day

Bill Dietz;
Troy Johnson

Colorado Gov. Signs
IBEW-Backed Apprentice Protection Law;
New NLRB Ruling Expands Employer Surveillance

New York Volunteers
Help Get Urgent PPE to Medical Workers;
Coronavirus Couldn't
Stop Local 94's
Annual Food Drive;
Indiana Women's Committee Starts Strong Out of the
Gate, Powering Horse Therapy Facility

Protect Yourselves
and Others;
A Family Affair

July 2020

Boston Local Finds New Signatory in
an 'Outkast'