Inside Quonset: An ecosystem of companies working on RI’s newest offshore wind farm

(WPRI) — Fifteen miles off of Rhode Island's nautical coast, construction is underway on the state's first utility-scale offshore wind farm.

Danish clean energy company Orsted estimates its turbines will generate enough energy to power more than 350,000 homes across Rhode Island and Connecticut.

But in order to have the project completed by 2026, a significant amount of work must also happen on land. At Quonset Business Park, a collection of companies charged with working on the new wind farm project have formed their own ecosystem.

Touring Quonset Business Park Steven King, the managing director of the Quonset Development Corporation, took Target 12 on a tour across the business park in October. King's tour began on the coastline, where crews are working on the cable lines that will eventually bring offshore power to Rhode Island's mainland.

"The cables are going to come up Narragansett Bay under the Jamestown Bridge," he explained.

King said construction crews have been using horizontal directional drilling, a process the EPA describes as a low-impact way to establish utility lines.

Down the street, King said, those power lines will connect to a new substation being built by Rhode Island Energy that will eventually bring offshore wind energy to the grid.

King said this land was particularly perfect for the new substation because it could not have been used for anything else.

"At one time, when the Navy had the property, it was an old abandoned landfill area," King said. "It was a good hand-in-hand opportunity to put it there and not take away any development opportunity for jobs."

Quonset, which King estimated is roughly the size of North Providence, is home to about 240 companies and more than 14,000 jobs.

King said renewable energy has only ever made up a fraction of the work happening at Quonset, but over the last decade, the offshore wind industry has gained ground inside the park, from Orsted to Survivetec, a company that makes suits that protect offshore wind workers from wind and water.

In the meantime, a few transformers nearly three stories tall have arrived next door to Ocean State Job Lot's Headquarters. King said they will be installed at the newly built substation.

"We have trailers there that came into the Port of Davisville," he said.

Building a green infostructure While Quonset prepares to provide clean power to Rhode Islanders, the business park has also been establishing its own green infrastructure.

King said about 75% of Quonset is powered by renewable energy, from large solar arrays spread throughout the park to turbines expected to power the business park's water wells.

The towers, about the size of a pick-up truck in diameter, will be taken to East Greenwich, King said.

"The site they have on Devil's Foot Road is fairly close to the park," he said. "We're going to lease a portion of the ground to install the wind turbine and sell some power back to operate the well facility."

The future of the Port of Davisville The next stop on the tour is the Port of Davisville, a landmark for massive ships looking to drop off cargo, including cars of nearly every make and model that are so new they still have the plastic on the windows. But King said the piers have also become a hub for offshore wind crews.

"In 2023, we had 260 ships coming to the port," he said. "Of those, 57 of them were related to offshore wind. So a lot of offshore wind companies are using the port."

Work is also happening on the piers themselves, as King said they are now replacing aging infrastructure. And even more work is expected, since Rhode Island voters approved $15 million for Quonset as part of the Green Bond.

It's here where Target 12 asked King how he sees offshore wind fitting into Quonset's future.

"For us, it's about this port facility where we're standing," he said. "Providing this platform for those companies constructing the wind farm. And to continue to have this port facility and the airport facility to continue to provide those logistics needed for major offshore construction."

Kate Wilkinson ( ) is a Target 12 investigative reporter for 12 News. Connect with her on Twitter and Facebook .