The challenge of a purposeful design addressed in this article is to align offshore energy systems not only with technical and economic values like efficiency and profitability, but also with moral and social values more generally. We elaborate a theoretical framework that allows us to make a systematic inventory of embedded values of offshore energy systems and relate them to their societal acceptability. By characterizing both objects and subjects of acceptability, we shed light on ways to identify areas of value conflicts that must be addressed in purposeful design. We suggest the capabilities approach as a normative theory to deal with the arising value conflicts.