Wind on the Water

  • Energy developers are watching how the Cape Wind Project plays out. It could clear the way for more big wind farms off the coasts of places such as New York, Maryland, and Michigan. (Photo courtesy of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory)

A big shift to alternative energies
such as wind and solar will take a
change in thinking. One example is
the Cape Wind project. Cape Wind
plans to build one-hundred-thirty
windmills in the water. It would
be the country’s first off-shore
wind farm, but not everybody likes
it. Mark Brush reports the fight
over this wind farm could clear
the path for others:

Transcript

A big shift to alternative energies
such as wind and solar will take a
change in thinking. One example is
the Cape Wind project. Cape Wind
plans to build one-hundred-thirty
windmills in the water. It would
be the country’s first off-shore
wind farm, but not everybody likes
it. Mark Brush reports the fight
over this wind farm could clear
the path for others:

Say you want to make some money putting up windmills. You need a place with lots of wind, lots of open space, and lots of people who will want to buy your power.

It turns out, Nantucket Sound off the east coast is an ideal setting.

Jim Gordon first proposed the Cape Wind Project in 2001. The windmills would be as tall as 40 story buildings. And could power hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses.

“Look, it’s not a question of Cape Wind or nothing. It’s a question of Cape Wind or a new nuclear plant or a new coal plant, or a heavy oil fired power plant.”

And that’s where people on Cape Cod get their power now – a power plant that burns oil. Boats making deliveries to the power plant have spilled oil into the water.

Jim Gordon thought it was a no-brainer. Replace dirty power plants with clean renewable energy.

But his plan ran into a bunch of opposition from rich and powerful people.

Roger Whitcomb wrote a book on the Cape Wind Project. Whitcomb said at a recent lecture that a lot of the opposition came from names we’re all familiar with – the Kennedys, the duPonts, and the Mellons.

“Most of these people were summer people. And they basically just didn’t want to look at these wind turbines, or the way they thought would look, because many of them had actually never seen a wind farm or a wind turbine. But they didn’t like the idea of anything violating the visual integrity of their horizon.”

There’s also some opposition from fisherman, some Indian tribes, and some locals who live on the islands. But Whitcomb says the bulk of the money for the fight against the Cape Wind Project comes from the rich and powerful.

Right now, those groups are challenging environmental reviews and permits in the Massachusetts Supreme Court. All these legal challenges – all these permitting hoops – put a damper on big projects.

Roger Whitcomb says we used to be a people who thought big. But that’s changed.

“It’s very difficult to do anything in the United States anymore. We’re way behind everybody else. This isn’t a can-do country anymore. There’s been a huge change. This is not where things are done.”

Energy developers are watching how the Cape Wind Project plays out. It could clear the way for more big wind farms off the coasts of places such as New York, Maryland, and Michigan.

And despite all the legal and political barriers, it looks like the country is closer than ever to seeing its first ever offshore wind farm built.

There’s a lot of popular support for the project in the region.

Ken Salazar heads up the Department of Interior. He told us this past spring he expects projects like Cape Wind will go forward.

“You know I expect that it will happen during the first term of the Obama Administration. I think that there is huge potential for wind energy off the shores of especially the Atlantic because of the shallowness of those waters.”

Siting big wind farms is a new kind of battle in this country. In some cases – like the Cape Wind project – energy development is moving closer to the wealthy.

Ian Bowles is the Secretary of the Energy and Environmental Affairs Department for the State of Massachusetts:

“Many of the dirty fossil plants of a generation ago were sited in cities and many times in environmental justice areas where there’s lower income residents. And I think today, you’ve got in many ways you have more wealthy set of opponents of wind power that is going to relieve the people who live in cities of some of the clean air burdens from siting decisions made a generation ago.”

That means some wind farms can change the game. They move power plants from the backyards of the poor, and into the views of the rich and powerful.

For The Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.

Related Links

Interview: Cape Wind Controversy

  • The proposed Cape Wind Project in Nantucket Sound is upsetting to some of the resort area residents (Source: Les Salty, at Wikimedia Commons)

The first offshore wind power
project expected to go online
is in Nantucket Sound near the
Cape Cod, Massachusetts resort
area. Some of the residents
of the region are rich and powerful.
They don’t want 130 wind turbines
ruining their view. Lester Graham
talked with the CEO of the Cape
Wind project, Jim Gordon, about why
the wind farm couldn’t be installed
over the horizon and out of sight:

Transcript

The first offshore wind power
project expected to go online
is in Nantucket Sound near the
Cape Cod, Massachusetts resort
area. Some of the residents
of the region are rich and powerful.
They don’t want 130 wind turbines
ruining their view. Lester Graham
talked with the CEO of the Cape
Wind project, Jim Gordon, about why
the wind farm couldn’t be installed
over the horizon and out of sight:

Jim Gordon: Well, first of all, hopefully, in the next ten, fifteen, or twenty years we’ll be able to bring wind turbines further off-shore, and they’ll be commercially and technically viable. But, right now, if you look at the off-shore wind farms in Europe that are commercially and technically viable, those projects are being built in near-shore, shallow waters, lower wave regimes. So, it’s really what’s driving the selection of the Cape Wind site is that it has some of the best wind resources on the East Coast, it’s outside of the shipping channels, ferry lines, and air flight paths, it has a reasonable proximity to bring the transmission line to the shore, and it has shallow depths and a low wave height. And, with all of this, it’s 13 miles from Nantucket, 9 miles from Edgar Town on Martha’s Vineyard, and 6 miles from Hyannis. So, if one were to go to the nearest beach and look out on the horizon, it would have to be a very clear day for you to make out tiny specks on the horizon. People want this project built, because they recognize that our energy security, climate change, sustainable economic development, the clean energy jobs that go with a project like this are important. And, we have to live with trade-offs if we’re going to transition to a more sustainable energy future.

Lester Graham: I wonder what you think of the Kennedy’s, who have been so active on the environmental front, fighting your proposal.

Gordon: You know, I have a lot of respect for Senator Kennedy, and our hope is the more he reads about Cape Wind, and the more he looks at and his staff looks at the final environmental impact statement from the federal government that was extremely positive, as well as the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. I mean, I’m hoping that the more Senator Kennedy thinks about this project, and looks at how it’s going to address the urgent energy, environmental, and economic challenges facing Massachusetts and the region. You know, I’m hoping that he’ll come around and support the project.

Graham: How do you think what happens with your project will effect other off-shore proposals?

Gordon: I think that this project is going to set an important precedent. If a project like Cape Wind – which has run this exhaustive regulatory gauntlet, and has shown that the public is in favor of it, and that it’s passed muster – if this project is not approved, I think that it’s going to set a terrible precedent. I think that other developers that are looking at moving away from coal or some of the fossil fuels to tap our abundant off-shore wind resources, I think that they’ll have some real second thoughts about investing the enormous amount of time and resources that it takes to get one of these projects in the water.

Graham: Jim Gordon is the President of Cape Wind, the off-shore wind project proposed to be built there in Nantucket. Thanks for your time.

Gordon: Thank you, Lester.

Related Links

All Eyes on the Cape Wind Project

  • The Cape Wind Project proposes to build 130 wind turbines miles off the coast in the Atlantic Ocean (Source: Kmadison at Wikimedia Commons)

Offshore wind farm developers are closely
watching a proposed project in Nantucket
Sound. Lester Graham reports the Cape
Wind offshore wind energy project could be
the first in the nation to be approved:

Transcript

Offshore wind farm developers are closely
watching a proposed project in Nantucket
Sound. Lester Graham reports the Cape
Wind offshore wind energy project could be
the first in the nation to be approved:

For nine years, Cape Wind has been working its way through the permitting process.

But some residents in the Massachusetts resort areas around Nantucket Sound have fought against it including Senator Edward Kennedy.

The 130 wind turbines would be miles off the coast, but some residents say it would ruin the view from their coastal houses.

Jim Gordon is the CEO of Cape Wind.

“If this project is not approved, I think it’s going to set a terrible precedent. I think that other developers, I think they’ll have some real second thoughts about investing the enormous amount of time and resources that it takes to get one of these projects in the water.”

Developers are considering offshore wind energy turbines along the mid-Atlantic coast, the Great Lakes and the Gulf Coast, close to the populated areas that need additional power.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

Related Links