Offshore wind projects in US see renewed interest

"There's a palpable sense that it's finally happening," said Bryan Martin, a managing director at D.E. Shaw & Co., a New York hedge fund that's the principal backer of Deepwater Wind, a Rhode Island-based company looking to launch the country's first offshore wind farm off Block Island's shores by the end of the year.

OffshoreMW, which is owned by the private equity giant the Blackstone Group and has ties to a company that recently completed a wind farm in Germany's North Sea, has also joined the fray in Massachusetts, securing federal development rights to an area near DONG's lease.

Offshore wind power, she noted, is more costly to produce than natural gas or other forms of renewable energy like solar power or land-based wind turbines.

Martin, of D.E. Shaw & Co., says technological advances already in place in Europe — like larger, more powerful turbines — will help bring the cost of offshore wind power down, though he and other developers have so far declined to say by how much, citing the competitive nature of the business.