Oct. 16--ORONO, Maine -- A University of Maine-led research and development effort to explore deepwater offshore wind power in the Gulf of Maine received an $8 million boost Thursday, with up to $5 million more possibly on the way.

The Department of Energy announced Thursday afternoon it has awarded a 38-member consortium led by UMaine's Advanced Structures and Composites Center an $8 million grant to develop and deploy three small-scale deepwater offshore wind turbines that will float on composite platforms off the coasts of Maine and New Hampshire.

Click here for a list of consortium participants.

Two of the turbine models, which could all be in place in the next two years, will be located in one as-yet undetermined site in the Gulf of Maine. The third model will be located at the Maine-New Hampshire border. Researchers will use the models to develop lightweight composite platforms with the eventual goal of a large-scale floating wind farm in the Gulf of Maine, which would be the first of its kind in the world.

"This puts Maine in the drivers' seat of deepwater offshore technology in the country," UMaine professor Habib Dagher, the director of the Advanced Structures and Composites Center, said Thursday. "The fact that the Department of Energy has selected us provides a catalyst for industry in the state to work with us to help achieve this goal. It's a bright day for Maine [and] a bright day for the future of Maine."

The $8 million could grow to $13 million for the Advanced Structures and Composites Center if President Barack Obama signs an energy and water budget bill the Senate passed 80-17 Thursday afternoon and the House approved earlier. The bill includes a $5 million appropriation for the UMaine center secured by U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, a member of the Senate Appropriation Committee.

The $5 million would go toward establishing a UMaine-based national center for deepwater offshore wind research and development. Part of the allocation would also go toward the development of the models.

Dagher, a longtime advocate for Maine to be the site of future research and development of deepwater offshore wind facilities, has equated the Gulf of Maine's wind capacity to that of Saudi Arabia for oil production.

Dagher, who testified last summer about wind energy in front of Congress' Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs, has estimated Maine has the potential to produce about 130 gigawatts of power in deep water -- 60 to 900 meters deep -- within 50 nautical miles of the coast.

By comparison, the entire U.S.