In the waters off Massachusetts, a hunt for foreign ships building wind farms

A few minutes later, the Sea Installer appeared, a startling sight as it was jacked up above the ocean surface on four massive legs to allow it to serve as an enormous work station to install off-shore wind turbines.

The goal, Spaid said, was to determine if the Danish vessel used foreign workers in violation of the century-old Jones Act, a federal law that requires ships carrying goods between two US points to be American-owned, American-built, and American crewed.

The quixotic quest of the Jones Act Enforcer is the work of the industry group Offshore Marine Service Association (OMSA), and among its latest targets is the Vineyard Wind project, the country’s first major offshore commercial wind farm, located 13 miles west of Martha’s Vineyard, where work started this summer.

The marine association suspects many of the ships engaged in building the massive turbines, including the Danish-owned Sea Installer, might be violating the spirit, if not the actual language, of the Jones Act.

The law is supposed to protect American jobs, said OMSA president Aaron Smith. Instead, foreign-owned ships working in US waters are employing foreign workers, at lower wages than their US counterparts.

“We simply can not compete on cost,” Smith said. “These are opportunities that should be enjoyed by United States citizens.”

These mini-skirmishes playing out in the waters off the Massachusetts coast have big implications for jobs in the state’s nascent offshore wind industry. They also underscore a high stakes drama pitting President Biden’s goals to create American jobs and fight climate change against the realities of standing up a clean energy industry using a supply chain that spans the globe.

The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), passed a year ago, has infused billions of dollars into clean energy projects, and the Biden administration has touted the law as a way to create millions of American jobs in the process. But experts say the country lacks the necessary supply chain, including massive, highly-specialized ships like the Sea Installer, to actually build what the law calls for.

In offshore wind, US ventures have turned to European companies for specialized vessels, equipment, and personnel — much to the chagrin of groups such as the offshore marine association, which say that, under the Jones Act, those jobs should go to American firms and workers.

Officially known as the Merchant Marine Act of 1920, the Jones Act was written after World War I to help build a strong American merchant marine fleet and backstop the Navy and Marines during times of war.

But a century later, critics say the Jones Act is protectionist and outdated, especially in a globalized economy. Requiring that only American ships carry cargo between US ports only drives up cost. It’s a key reason why liquid natural gas is shipped to New England from Europe, instead of from closer suppliers in the US Gulf Coast. And it complicates industries such as offshore wind, which are currently dominated by more experienced European companies.

Yet despite several efforts to repeal the Jones Act, the law has prevailed and even enjoys the support of Biden, who casts himself as a champion of organized labor and high paying American jobs in growing industries like clean energy.

The president touted the IRA at an event in Philadelphia in July to mark the construction of the Acadia, a US made ship designed to help secure the base of offshore wind turbines to the seabed.

“There are some who are content to rely on ships built overseas, without American crews to operate them,” said Biden, citing his support for the Jones Act. “Again, not on my watch. We’re strengthening American shipbuilding, supporting good union jobs and bringing offshore-wind supply chains back home.”

Unlike its predecessor, the Biden administration has embraced offshore wind as a potential major source of clean energy, and is greenlighting projects up and down the East Coast; Vineyard Wind is the first major one to launch construction. And the IRA provides generous tax breaks to wind farms that begin construction before 2026, which analysts say is a good first step towards building a viable domestic wind power industry. But even with federal and state support, the economics have proven…