SWEENEY, BURZICHELLI, TALIAFERRO: NEW WIND PORT WILL MAKE SALEM COUNTY THE HUB OF OFFSHORE WIND INDUSTRY

September 9, 2021

Legislators applaud ground-breaking for Wind Port that will create 1,500 permanent jobs

Lower Alloways Creek - Senate President Steve Sweeney, Deputy Assembly Speaker John J. Burzichelli and Assemblyman Adam J. Taliaferro today said the New Jersey Wind Port would make Salem County the center of a $150 billion East Coast offshore wind industry that will eventually employ tens of thousands of workers from Maine to the Carolinas.

“This new Wind Port will fulfill a dream we had a decade ago to make South Jersey the staging, assembly, manufacturing and shipping base for the offshore wind industry for the entire Atlantic Seaboard,” Senate President Steve Sweeney (D-Gloucester/Salem/Cumberland) said at the ground-breaking ceremony today.

“The Wind Port will create 1,500 permanent jobs, employ hundreds of construction workers, and generate up to $500 million in economic activity in Salem County,” Assembly Deputy Speaker John J. Burzichelli (D-Gloucester/Salem/Cumberland) noted. “Offshore wind will be one of the nation’s fastest-growing industry sectors, and Salem County is poised to grow along with it.”

“This is the perfect location,” added Assemblyman Adam J. Taliaferro (D-Gloucester/Salem/Cumberland). “The wind turbines that are being assembled are so massive that they cannot go under bridges, which is why Artificial Island on Delaware Bay is such a perfect location. It is also adjacent to the PSE&G nuclear plants, which are far from population centers but have the sophisticated infrastructure needed.”

Senator Sweeney and Assemblymen Burzichelli and Taliaferro thanked U.S. Labor Secretary Martin Walsh for coming to the 3rd Legislative District to attend the ground-breaking for the Wind Port, citing it as a prime example of how government investment in infrastructure can spur economic growth and create jobs.

“Wind energy is our future – it’s clean, it’s safe, and it offers the opportunity for New Jersey to be a dominant leader in creating a new sector for our nation's economy,” said Senator Sweeney. “That’s why I sponsored the Offshore Wind Economic Development Act in 2010, and today we saw that vision become a reality.”