With the onslaught of several GWs of Northeast US offshore wind due online in the next 5 years which transmission operators will unify to to address intermittency?

In my humble opinion US OSW boat has sailed, with federal lease funding, oil major ESG dollars and above average wind resource even before the Administration supported it. I’m just curious if the various ISOs have an ongoing dialogue on seams issues when a few GWs go offline due to a hurricane.

There is nothing certain about these projects.  While it is great you could build a resource out in the ocean, that is a small part of the picture.  The reality of the environmental impacts to aquatic life to bring the transmission lines back to the shore, not to mention the incremental capacity that needs to be built into corridors on land, will be the defining factor as to whether or not these facilities are constructed at all.  Very specifically to your point, CREZ corridors in Texas were developed in one state, under one governing authority that has complete control of the ISO for the state.  Simply put, the state could make a decision and execute.  This is not the case for any of the projects in the NE.  Many different states and the Federal government will have to be involved in the decision making process and we have ultimately failed at any sort of effective process to fast track transmission approvals/processes in this arena.  Incremental gains have been made, but I think everyone will agree that much more needs to be done if we are serious about this type of strategy for our country.  So the challenge is definitely still in front of us, not behind us.  

The technical challenges of incorporating the resource are just math and we have proven very capable of managing these challenges in the past decade.  Again, look at Texas and the vast amount of wind that has been brought on to that isolated system.  Is there a learning curve and challenges?  Yes, but nothing we cannot figure out.  

The good news is that offshore wind has much better capacity factors and capabilities than on-shore wind.  Therefore, the overall impacts to the grid infrastructure can be managed much more effectively, especially if the infrastructure is designed and built to support the resource.  So we are once again brought back in the circular argument of whether or not the infrastructure can be permitted and built.

And finally, as I always mention, the distribution utility's ability to create partnerships with their customers will ultimately define success for the scale penetration of renewables.  Our thinking has to transcend building only big bulky things and we have to recognize that planning from the bottom up must become our new norm.  The capabilities of technologies already installed today to make this happen have proven the value of dynamic customer relationships and we must build on that to a future where our connected world optimizes across the entire energy value chain, not one segment of it.