Plan for Wind Farm Off Massachusetts Clears State Hurdle (Cape Wind) - NYT

[Eugene]

Source: New York Times

Plan for Wind Farm Off Massachusetts Clears State Hurdle

By PAM BELLUCK
Published: March 31, 2007

BOSTON, March 30 — A proposal to build the country’s first offshore wind farm
in the waters off Cape Cod won state environmental approval on Friday, bringing
the project a major step closer to being built.

The project, known as Cape Wind, would involve 130 wind turbines in a 25-square-
mile area in Nantucket Sound, and would provide as much as 79 percent of the
electricity for the cape, Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket.

-snip-

On Friday, Ian A. Bowles, the state’s secretary of environmental affairs, said the
environmental report for Cape Wind had passed state muster. Because the turbines
are planned for federal waters, a federal environmental review must still be
completed, a process that is expected to take much of this year.

-snip-

He said that compared with electricity generated by power plants, Cape Wind would
offset 802 tons of sulfur dioxide, 497 tons of nitrous oxide and 733,876 tons of
carbon dioxide each year.

-snip-

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/31/us/31wind.html

---

Source: Reuters

Plan for big offshore wind farm passes hurdle

By Jason Szep
Fri Mar 30, 4:21 PM ET

BOSTON (Reuters) - A controversial plan to build the first large U.S. offshore wind-
power farm won approval from Massachusetts authorities on Friday but still must
clear federal regulatory hurdles.

Cape Wind Associates LLC, a privately funded Boston-based energy company, has
proposed constructing 130 wind turbines over 24 square miles in Nantucket Sound,
within view of the wealthy Cape Cod resort region of Massachusetts.

The project, which would meet the energy needs of some 400,000 homes,
"adequately and properly complies" with the Massachusetts Environmental Policy
Act, said the state environmental affairs secretary, Ian Bowles.

-snip-

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070330/us_nm/energy_capewind_dc

[youngdem]

1. Fishing will improve too

All of those windmills will be great structure in the water for fish. On the Gulf Coast off of Louisiana, there would be very little structure for fish to orient to in our muddy bottomed waters, so the oil rigs act as great artificial reefs, so much so that many fisherman want the structures be left (the underwater portion anyway) in place when the rig is removed.

Nice unintended side benefit.