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The House of Representatives of the US State of New Hampshire has passed a new bill that removes the offshore wind scope from the state Office of Offshore Wind Industry Development and Energy Innovation, and amends several other state-level efforts established to support offshore wind by either withdrawing or modifying them to move away from offshore wind. House Bill 682, which passed the House with a 206-163 vote on 20 February and is now before the State Senate, renames the Office of Offshore Wind Industry Development and Energy Innovation to Office of Energy Innovation. The State of New Hampshire established the Office in July 2021 and tasked it with supporting the work of the New Hampshire members of the Gulf of Maine Intergovernmental Offshore Wind Renewable Energy Task Force, the New Hampshire Commission to Study Offshore Wind and Port Development, and coordinating New Hampshire’s offshore wind industry economic development policy, among other roles. The new bill also repeals the Offshore and Port Development Commission and the Offshore Wind Industry Workforce Training Center Committee, and puts the advisory councils for grid modernisation and hydrogen under the Office of Energy Innovation. The new bill follows shortly after another proposed legislation on offshore wind was introduced in New Hampshire, House Bill 575-FN, which would have banned offshore wind procurement and construction. The bill, introduced on 9 January, did not pass the House. |
