FERC and the state government signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to coordinate their respective review work of the schemes in a move to reduce the number of regulatory formalities for projects.
Key aspects of the coordination effort include notifications, agreed scheduling and milestones, environmental reviews and consideration of any detailed plans put forward at state-level.
FERC added that the MoU with Washington follows a similar deal with Oregon last year.
Over recent months FERC and the Department of the Interior (DoI) have sorted their differences over jurisdictional authority of hydrokinetic projects on the US Outer Continental Shelf. In effect, FERC has authority over projects and DoI controls the offshore access corridors.
