Karl E. Humberson jokes that his leadership role in building the nation’s largest offshore wind project: Dominion Energy’s $10 billion, 178-turbine CVOW off the coast of Virginia, which is about to ‘ finish at the end of 2026, began as a respite from sub-zero temperatures they endured in a Midwest gas project for the company.
“When I got back to my hotel room, I got a call asking if I’d be willing to help build” something new hundreds of miles to the east: giant ocean-based machines at the ready to generate 2.6 GW of energy on a 113,000-acre site 27 miles offshore. “They could have asked me to be a cook and I would have said yes at the time.”
On a more serious note, Dominion’s project manager says his instinct to take on the challenge now involves managing a global supply chain, complex logistics and a policy change to install giant turbines manufactured by Siemens Gamesa, each of 869 feet at the height of the tip and generate 14.7 meters. MW, as well as a large supporting infrastructure, all in a risky physical environment – project conditions “I’ve always been attracted to,” he says.
Joining the company in 2011 with a marine engineering degree and experience in the energy sector, and elevated last July to vice president of offshore wind construction, Humberson is making headway in a sector driven by recovery in inflation, gaps supply chain and approval policies during the first Trump administration. that was reversed under President Joe Biden, but could resurface from the erratic campaign comments of now President-elect Donald Trump.
As a regulated utility, with established project returns and hard-won ratepayer charges from regulators, and with key contractors and costs mostly locked in before COVID-19, Dominion has avoided many financial issues faced by commercial developers. CVOW “is a credible testament to the ability to build large-scale wind farms,” says Theodore Paradise, a lawyer and policy expert at developer CTC Global.
“Once you get your head around the scale of the components, which is amazing, you realize that … moving things around the world becomes quite complex,” says Humberson. It gained experience building CVOW’s two pilot turbines in 2020. Although they are only 6MW each, they now provide insights into generating “real reliability statistics for modelling” and have helped regulators to ‘approval of wind permits, he says.
Humberson also oversaw the off-site construction in Texas of Charybdis, the 472-foot-long turbine installation vessel soon to arrive at CVOW. It is the first to comply with decades of federal rules allowing only domestic vessels at offshore wind sites. US developers have had to use complicated and expensive transfer through Canadian ports or barge-assisted facilities for components of mostly foreign manufacturing projects. Manufacturing delays canceled earlier use of the ship by other developers and pushed its price tag to $715 million, but Humberson says these are balanced against the higher costs and risks of the old method
Humberson, on the right. takes into account CVOW’s marshalling site in Portsmouth, Va., in the cabin of Belgium-based contractor DEME’s giant Orion crane with first-time crane operator Gary Waumans before the equipment is loaded onto a ship for installation lar foundations at sea for the project’s 176 wind turbines. , 14.7 MW each.
Photo courtesy of Dominion Energy
Work is underway, with 82 turbine foundations installed since CVOW’s project shutdown at the end of October for whale migration. It will restart in the spring, now bolstered by a $2.6 billion private investor deal last year with Stonepeak for a 50% stake in the project.
Humberson says the steady progress of the project has increased confidence in the supply chain. South Korean manufacturer LS Greenlink’s unit announced a $681 million high-voltage submarine cable plant in Chesapeake, Va., in 2024, a first in the United States, with Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) , saying it will “show the [state] as a manufacturing leader in the offshore wind industry.”
Mark D. Mitchell, Dominion’s senior vice president of all energy project construction, points to Humberson’s “excellent construction and commercial skills and being a problem solver,” as well as his strategy of developing the force of work offering “talented employees who want to be on the ground.” plant of something special…as much exposure as possible to all facets of project management…in one fascinating mega-project.”
Humberson sees more potential work in developing Dominion’s remaining offshore wind lease sites, or in other of its growing energy areas, such as small modular nuclear reactors. “I feel like the industry didn’t think we’d be where we are today,” he says.
Observers point to the importance of the project’s success.
“Very few power plants are that big, and no other form of generation could be built in two years,” says Willett Kemp, a professor of electrical engineering and marine policy at the University of Delaware and a nationally known expert on offshore wind energy and policy. . questions “Virginia needs electricity and there’s only one project ready to go.” He says CVOW would “advance the learning rate and supply chain of the overall offshore wind industry.”
Related to the political impacts generated in the new administration, Kemp says that while Trump has called for construction jobs, new infrastructure, US, energy dominance and a greater global role for local manufacturing, “killing a big source of new electricity that AI depends on. Even delays, especially for a project already permitted and ready to build, would be costly and damaging to Virginia.”
He adds: “Hopefully the president-elect and his advisers will make the right trade-offs between these conflicting campaign promises.”
