NORTHAMPTON — Sublime Systems Inc. has announced an agreement to reserve 2,000 tons of its low-carbon cement for use in Vineyard Offshore’s planned wind farm.

The reservation agreement depends on state approval of the company’s 1,200-megawatt Vineyard Wind 2 project in three states, but both parties were eager to announce the deal this week and hailed its potential benefits.

“We are honored to welcome Vineyard Offshore as a future customer of Sublime Systems, as the proliferation of clean energy inspired our founding and mission to decarbonize cement,” Sublime founder and CEO Leah Ellis said in a statement. “This substantial order, contingent on award of the Vineyard Wind 2 project, will aid in seeding clean energy manufacturing in Massachusetts.”

Under the agreement, 2,000 tons of cement from Sublime’s nascent Holyoke manufacturing plant would be used in working platforms on turbines and onshore civil works, reducing the carbon footprint of the Vineyard Wind 2 project.

“We reserve a certain volume, for which we know what the price will be,” said Zach Fuerst, Vineyard Offshore’s business development director.

Both projects are in the early stages, but Sublime’s target opening of 2026 should position it to be ready to fulfill the order when it’s needed, according to Joe Hicken, Sublime’s vice president of business development and policy.

Vineyard Offshore is soliciting power contracts for Vineyard Wind 2 with Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts. Approval by any of the states would put the project in gear, with construction expected to begin in 2027 and run through 2031, according to Fuerst.

Hicken is in charge of scouting future customers for the company’s cement, but he said Vineyard Offshore broached the idea after learning about Sublime’s innovative product.

“As they are a developer of ultra-low-carbon cement, we thought it would be a natural partnership,” Fuerst said. “We want to invest in making Massachusetts a cleantech innovation hub of the world.”

The wind-power developer’s goals are to reinforce the clean energy ecosystem in Massachusetts at the same time as it lowers its own carbon footprint, which includes embodied carbon in its infrastructure, Hicken said.

Hicken said he had met recently with Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Rebecca Tepper, and it was clear that wind-power development “is a huge priority for the Healey administration.”

Global issue

Mixed with water, sand and gravel, cement is used to make concrete, one of the most widely used substances on the planet. Production of cement, commonly made by decomposing limestone at extremely high temperatures, accounts for roughly 8% of global greenhouse gas emissions.

The cement sector is the third-largest industrial source of pollution in the U.S., according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

Sublime uses an electrochemical process that entirely bypasses the need for extreme heat and limestone in the traditional method of producing cement. The process extracts reactive calcium and silicates from non-carbonate rocks at ambient temperature.

The Somerville company, whose pilot plant can produce up to 250 tons of cement a year, announced in January that it had signed a lease-to-own agreement for a 16-acre former industrial property on Water Street in Holyoke, where it would build its new manufacturing plant.

Sublime expects the plant to produce 30,000 tons of cement annually and provide at least 70 jobs. The goal is for hiring to begin in the middle of next year and for the factory to be up and running by the first quarter of 2026.

Climate innovation lab

Vineyard Offshore stated that it expects to invest $3 million to drive innovation in the offshore wind industry in support of the Healey administration’s goal of making Massachusetts a climate innovation lab for the world.

“Offshore wind is a cornerstone of Massachusetts’ clean energy leadership, and we are proud to support the state’s continued leadership with investments in climate innovation in our next project,” Vineyard Offshore CEO Alicia Barton said in a statement.

Vineyard Offshore is the American arm of Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, a Danish renewable energy developer that is a co-owner of the wind farm along with Avangrid Renewables LLC, an American subsidiary of Spanish utility Iberdrola.

Vineyard Wind 1, which began producing energy in the winter, is the nation’s first commercial-scale offshore wind energy project. It is more than 15 miles off the coast of Massachusetts, south of Martha’s Vineyard.

The operators announced three weeks ago that Vineyard Wind 1 was delivering more than 136 megawatts to the electric grid in Massachusetts, making it the largest operating offshore wind farm in the U.S. Its goal is to produce 806 megawatts, enough to power 400,000 homes and businesses.

The wind farm suffered a setback last weekend, however, when part of a 351-foot blade on one of the turbines sheared off, casting debris into the ocean, in what Vineyard Wind called a “blade damage incident.” More of the blade dropped off Thursday.

The federal Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement has ordered the company to suspend operations while the incident is investigated.

Nantucket’s south-facing beaches were closed to swimming for a day due to floating debris and sharp fiberglass shards washing up on shore.

The company said it had mobilized cleanup teams to recover the debris. GE, which manufactured and installed the turbines and blades, was working on determining the root cause, it said.

James Pentland can be reached at jpentland@gazettenet.com.