A Viable Marine Renewable Energy Industry:
Solutions to Legal, Economic, and Policy
Challenges
October 23-24, 2008
Roger Williams University School of Law
Bristol, Rhode Island
This two-day Symposium explored means
to achieve a viable marine renewable
energy industry for the United States
with a focus on offshore wind,
hydrokinetics (wave, current and tidal),
and ocean thermal energy conversion.
Its panels discussed a range of
solutions for the nascent U.S. marine
renewable energy sector’s current legal,
economic and policy challenges. These
included:
Jurisdictional and
permitting/licensing schemes.
Developing
strategies for marine renewable
energy
regulation.
Financing and
economic issues.
Renewable energy
integration (engineering, market
and
policy).
Human dimension
issues.
International
perspectives on offshore energy
projects.
Offshore energy
research & development funding.
The Symposium’s goal
was to quantify
means of supporting a marine renewable
energy industry, while addressing local,
tribal, state, federal and public needs
related to the protection, conservation,
and management of our marine resources,
as well as co-existing with the many
uses of the marine environment.
