Cape Wind Still Hopeful to Construct America’s First Offshore Wind Farm

Harnessing the power of wind off the coast of Cape Cod was the vision business owner Jim Gordon had in mind to provide renewable clean energy to the New England area. And in 2001, Gordon and his independent power company, Energy Management Inc., pursued the idea of converting solar energy into mechanical power and Cape Wind was born. The energy conservation project, which began development in 2001, will be America’s first offshore wind farm, but legal battles and potential federal budget cuts might stall the construction of the wind farm.

Cape Wind is to be built on Cape Cod, off the coast of Horseshoe Shoal in Nantucket Sound—an area of the Atlantic Ocean, which connects Cape Cod on the north, Nantucket on the south and Martha’s Vineyard on the west in Massachusetts—and provide wind-powered electricity to the area. The wind farm will consist of 130 wind turbines, each placed between six and nine football field widths apart to still allow small boats to navigate through the shallow water, and “produce up to 420 megawatts of clean, renewable energy, While Cape Wind will make Cape Cod, Massachusetts a world-wide leader in wind energy technology, according to the project’s website, it is an alternative to fossil fuel therefore, reducing carbon emissions and creating an independence from foreign oil importing.

Talks of ocean-based wind farms have long been discussed, but in 2001, Gordon, founder and president of Energy Management Inc. (EMI) developed a plan to implement the clean energy project. As the Cape Wind developer, the Massachusetts-based independent energy company has a long-standing reputation of engineering, developing and constructing energy conservation projects, according to EMI’s website. EMI said the project would create thousands of jobs, 150 of which will be permanent, to help boost Cape Cod and the surrounding areas’ economy, while working to resolve the problem of global warming and climate change.

The project will also reduce the cost of wholesale electricity. The renewable, clean energy from Cape Wind will help provide future price stability and predictability, which fossil fuel fails to do, according to the Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities.

Since the project’s development, Cape Wind went through a vigorous “environmental permitting process by 17 federal and state agencies under the National Environmental Policy Act and the Massachusetts Environmental Policy Act,” according to its website. Cape Wind completed state and local permits in 2009 and was granted federal permits in April 2010, which progressed the project to the financial phase, bringing it one step closer to construction.

While many climate activists and supporters endorse Cape Wind, including Greenpeace USA and Sierra Club, a coalition of residents, Native Americans—the Wampanoag tribe believes the land to be sacred—and property owners within the wind farm area of Nantucket Sound oppose the project, filing numerous law suits against its initiative. But, according to the Huffington Post, the courts have denied all the suits leaving just four pending, which is said to give opponents reason to continue the fight.

The opponents said they are determined to protect the “natural beauty of the land” calling Cape Wind “an industrial-scale offshore wind power plant,” according to Save Our Sound—an alliance formed to protect Nantucket Sound from becoming a wind farm. The organization is highly against the wind farm because of the potential danger it has to Nantucket Sound’s ecology and the threat of an oil spill contaminating surrounding beaches. (A 10-story electrical service platform housing 40,000 gallons of transformer oil will be built along the coast to service Cape Wind and each wind turbine will hold approximately 190 gallons of oil, according to Save Our Sound’s website.)

A statement issued by Barnstable Land Trust—a non-profit membership organization dedicated to the preservation of the Sound—read:

“The ocean and bays that surround us are perhaps our town’s most important and defining natural resource and it is these unspoiled waters that are the very essence of Cape Cod. We are a community of people drawn to the sea as sightseers, swimmers, sailors, fishermen or beachcombers. We are thankful for, and jealously seek to protect, the open space of the ocean around us. There is no other part of our community that offers more sweeping vistas, wildlife diversity and a place of refuge from the steady march of development.”

Aside from the opposition it faces, Cape Wind has made progress throughout the years; it was granted the first U.S. commercial offshore lease in 2010, its construction and operations plans were approved in 2011 and recently, it entered the financial phase with the help of President Obama’s clean energy stimulus, according to Cape Wind’s website.

But its progression might come to a halt from “sequestration,” Ken Salazar, Interior Secretary, said at an offshore wind power conference that took place in Boston last week, according to WGBH News.

The pending budget cuts could delay Cape Wind from entering the construction phase and will slow the review and permit process for new emerging energy conservation projects. Yet, according to WGBH News, Salazar spoke highly of the project to a large conference audience and said that he wanted to see Cape Wind “break ground—or water—in 2013”

While Salazar ‘s resignation from his position will come at the end of March, he said that the Obama administration is just as determined to create wind power in the U.S., according to WGBH News.

As the project’s progression weighs on federal support, opponents of Cape Wind will continue their legal battle and make their voices heard through the ongoing Voice Your Opinion section of Save Our Sound’s website, which lists local media, state and local agencies and federal agencies to communicate all oppositions. But according to Cape Wind’s timeline, it is on pace to begin construction at the end of the year.

For more information about Cape Wind, visit their website.

Source Article from http://www.nationofchange.org/cape-wind-still-hopeful-construct-america-s-first-offshore-wind-farm-1362059413

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