A more than $500 million redevelopment project is transforming the former Lamberts Point Docks into a hub for offshore wind, shipbuilding and ship repair.
Called Fairwinds Landing, the 111-acre terminal already has one tenant associated with the offshore wind industry and several others interested in the site, Mike Hopkins, managing director of Fairwinds Landing LLC, said Thursday in Norfolk.
“We will land a major offshore wind manufacturer at Fairwinds Landing in the coming months,” Hopkins said.
The Miller Group, led by longtime Hampton Roads businessman Jerry Miller, announced the formation of a business partnership last year to develop the site, next to the Norfolk Southern coal terminal in the Chelsea neighborhood. The partnership includes businesses such as Balicore Construction in Virginia Beach and Fairlead Integrated in Portsmouth, a ship supplier and repair company.
Earlier this year, the development company announced it was beginning construction on an offshore wind monitoring and coordination center, a headquarters of sorts for Dominion Energy’s Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project, a 176-turbine wind farm 27 miles off the coast of Virginia Beach.
The facility will include a 31,167-square-foot operations and maintenance center and a 17,280-square-foot warehouse as well as 950 feet of pier frontage for vessels associated with the offshore wind project.
Hopkins said the facility will become an important staging area for those vessels, which will haul crew members to the wind farm and service the turbines.
Additionally, Hopkins said the area is also used for storing some of the enormous sections of aircraft carriers before they are assembled at Newport News Shipbuilding. He said the group is looking for other ways to extend their partnership in the future.
When Norfolk Southern decided to lease Lamberts Point Docks, Hopkins said The Miller Group leaders thought it was a “very big diamond. It was a very rough diamond.” Still, with President Joe Biden announcing a goal of 30,000 megawatts of offshore wind power by 2030, Hopkins said there could be billions of dollars in projects coming.
“When we see that many zeroes, we know there is some place that we can fit in,” he said.
Sean Washington, interim director of Norfolk’s economic development department, said the project was a sign that Norfolk was already a hub for the offshore wind industry.
“The industry is not going anywhere,” he said.
Washington said another person in his office said they hadn’t seen a potential economic impact to the city like Fairwinds since the former Ford plant that closed in 2007.
John Larson with Dominion Energy said the wind farm would generate enough energy to power 25% of the utility’s residential customers in the state. Additionally, more offshore wind sites would be opening up near Dominion’s project soon.
Hopkins said Fairwinds Landing now represented an investment of more than $500 million and would add around 750 jobs to Hampton Roads.
Trevor Metcalfe, 757-222-5345, trevor.metcalfe@pilotonline.com
