The squabble over the Cape Wind, an offshore wind farm off Cape Cod, has been raging for years now, with some residents of Nantucket who dearly prize their ocean views battling with pro-wind energy forces who want to establish the nation’s first major offshore wind farm. But after eight years of regulatory review, during which time no regulator has found that the project’s 130 turbines would cause harm to the environment, Cape Wind looked just about ready to be resolved, with one more regulatory hurdle waiting to be cleared.
Alas, the new year brought some bad news for Cape Wind backers:
In a new setback for a controversial wind farm proposed off Cape Cod, the National Park Service announced Monday that Nantucket Sound was eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places, guaranteeing further delays for the project.
Known as Cape Wind, the project is the nation’s first planned offshore wind farm and would cover 24 square miles in the sound, an area roughly the size of Manhattan. The Park Service decision came in response to a request from two Massachusetts Indian tribes, who said the 130 proposed wind turbines would thwart their spiritual ritual of greeting the sunrise, which requires unobstructed views across the sound, and disturb ancestral burial grounds.
The Park Service’s decision, which caught observers by surprise, no doubt throws the project’s prospects in doubt, and deals another blow to the cause of clean energy.
The ruling certainly caught the Obama administration’s attention. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, whose department oversees the Park Service, issued a statement calling on the principal parties in the dispute to meet next week to hammer out a “common-sense agreement” by March 1. Salazar added that if a deal isn’t reached, “I will be prepared to take the steps necessary to bring the permit process to conclusion.’’
Salazar’s statement is the boldest declaration of interest yet by the administration in the Cape Wind project. Perhaps after the frustrations of Copenhagen and cap-and-trade, the administration has a renewed sense of urgency about proving its commitment to clean energy. Certainly the comparison between the U.S. and its peers isn’t flattering to us: just two days ago, Britain announced that it would award £100 billion worth of development contracts for a new generation of offshore wind farms.
We won’t know until the meeting next week what the administration’s plan and next moves are. For now, we stick with a frustrating mantra familiar to followers of the Cape Wind saga: Stay tuned.
