Once the production wells have
been plugged and all necessary environmental cleanup operations have been
completed,
how can the abandoned Platform Holly offshore structure be repurposed? Mark
Weeks (then a Senior Project Engineer with URS Corporation in Goleta) and I co-authored
a preliminary conceptual engineering study to consider the possibilities.
The heavy steel production platform structure stands
mostly invisible in water just 212 feet deep. The basic idea is to reuse it as
the foundation for a standard Siemens-type offshore wind power turbine in the 8
to 10 megawatt class (which could power about 1,500 homes). This general
concept includes adapting the existing 8-inch-diameter platform-to-shore oil
pipeline as a primary electrical power conduit. It would also repurpose the
soon-to-be-abandoned Ellwood oil terminal as the site for an in-line energy
storage facility. Combined, they would produce constant-baseload power to the
local SoCal Edison grid; we've confirmed it has sufficient spare transmission
capacity.
This concept is "spot-on conformant"
with California's published goals for promoting clean and renewable offshore
wind power generation. In fact, more than half of that future wind-power
project already exists at Holly.