New Orleans – As part of the Biden-Harris administration’s goal of permitting 30 gigawatts of offshore wind by 2030, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) today announced it is preparing a draft environmental assessment (EA) to consider the impacts of potential offshore wind leasing in federal waters of the Gulf of Mexico.

The area that will be reviewed in the EA includes almost 30 million acres just west of the Mississippi River to the Texas/Mexican border. This is the same area for which BOEM requested public input when the agency published a Call for Information and Nominations in the Federal Register on Nov. 1, 2021. BOEM will narrow the area based on stakeholder and ocean user input before advancing any Wind Energy Areas, which are offshore locations that appear most suitable for wind energy development.