US backing of wind farm could come this week (Cape Wind)

[kristopher]

"The Bush administration is expected to issue as early as Friday a favorable final environmental review of the nation's first offshore wind farm project, clearing the way for Cape Wind to obtain a federal lease to erect 130 wind turbines in Nantucket Sound.

Nicholas Pardi, a spokesman for the Minerals Management Service, said last week that the agency, part of the Interior Department, is planning to release its findings "by the end of the year." Supporters of the project who have been told of the agency's timetable said a favorable review should come in the next few weeks and possibly on Dec. 5.

Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne would then have to wait 30 days to make the decision official and award the lease allowing the project to be located in federal waters. The supporters, as well the leader of the main opposition group, said they believe the administration wants this accomplished before Inauguration Day, Jan. 20.

Final state backing could follow early next year, said a spokesman for the state's Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs, culminating the developer's long struggle to gain approval for what seemed like a green power pipe dream when it was announced seven years ago: A giant wind farm anchored in the waters off Cape Cod.

"This is important not only..."

http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/green/articles/2008/12/02/us_backing_of_wind_farm_could_come_this_week/

[catnhatnh]

1. I honestly do not understand the opposition...

...or how a series of towers 5 miles offshore can affect property values. I've seen opposition to wind on this board and I don't understand that either. Yes I understand that winds can calm, and sun can be blocked by overcasts and clouds, but WHEN they produce they can reduce fossil fuel usage. Geothermal, at least as a ground preconditioner for heating and cooling airflow should be damn near a given for new construction. Commonsense old time planning, like aligning houses correctly and superinsulating northfacing walls, and building berms and planting windbreaks all can lower lifetime energy requirements for houses greatly. It truly becomes dollars and sense...even on spec built houses, planning and a small (5-10%) increase in initial costs could result in decades of savings. Minimum 6" sidewalls, solar siting, cleristories and passive solar storage walls are all no brainers. And pretty cheap during construction.

[Berry Cool]

2. Wind opponents are largely a bunch of NIMBYs who have never even seen a turbine before

but are convinced that they are ugly, will obstruct a view they paid millions of dollars to obtain, and will kill zillions of birds and bats (somehow they imagine these things whipping around like box fans or propeller blades and shredding animals). Their misgivings are mistaken. IMO.

[Nederland]

3. Is it true

That Ted Kennedy was a major force opposing this? Or is that just an internet rumor...

[kristopher]

4. What NIMBY looks like when it has great political power

Wendy Williams wrote a very good review of the way opposition to Cape Wind developed and was executed. It is (IMO) destined to be a classic study of the way petty motives work to impede necessary action to solve social problems.

And yes, the Kennedy name figures prominently; as does a whole host of Republicans and fossil fuel money across the country.

http://capewindbook.typepad.com/

[intheflow]

5. Me neither.

Even if you could see the turbines from those mansions, I don't see the problem. Every time I drive by a windfarm anywhere in the country, all I feel is happiness knowing that it's clean renewable energy. What these folks should be "seeing" when they look out to turbines is an increase in ecological purity that will ultimately serve to keep their property values up. :banghead: