Green Options

Kennedy was not known for his environmental politics, but what will be his legacy vis-a-vis the environment and energy? Will he be remembered for what many viewed as self-interested and elitist opposition to the proposed Cape Wind project, an offshore wind farm in Nantucket Sound, barley visible from the Kennedy’s Hyannisport compound?

Texas start-up Baryonyx awarded two offshore wind energy leases

Which state’s waters will be the home of the United States’ first offshore wind farm? Will it be Massachusetts, where an eight-year battle for a wind farm near Cape Cod seems like it may never end? How about a little further south, in Rhode Island or New Jersey? Will it be Delaware, where Bluewater Wind hopes to develop a project that would provide almost 1/3 of the energy needed by Delmarva Power? What about other Mid-Atlantic states like North Carolina or Virginia, where the Department of Interior says sites with easily-developed shallow water wind resources dot the coastline?

Well, if you answered none of the above, you may be on to something.

Texas General Land Office last week awarded leases to Baryonyx, authorizing the company to develop wind farms on three sites, two of which are offshore, with a total potential capacity of 3,000 megawatts.

The state of Massachusetts is hunting for unusual places to put wind turbines as it looks to meet an ambitious goal of producing 2,000 megawatts of windpower by 2020.

The Associated Press reports that state officials are encouraging municipal planners to look at using capped landfills as potential wind farm locations. Plans were also just announced for a military reservation on Cape Cod.

The state is hoping to jump start development, because right now, the AP reports, there are only 11 commercial scale turbines in the state. But, ther are dozens of smaller ones installed and nearly 200 other projects in various stages of planning.

With billions in stimulus dollars heading toward improving the electricity grid and building sustainable energy infrastructure, emission-free power may be coming to your neighborhood sooner than you think. Here are five of the biggest, most ambitious projects that are in the pipeline, both in the US and elsewhere.

Someday, the Cape Wind story will become a major Hollywood blockbuster.

Or at least a two-part television miniseries starring Ed Begley Jr. On the Discovery Channel.

The effort to build an offshore wind farm - it would be the US’s first - has thus far been a roller coaster ride for advocates and opponents alike.

If that movie is ever made, this Jan. 18 will occupy a turning point in the story’s script, the day the jury levees its verdict before a rapt courtroom. Here and now, the date stands as a milestone in the life of the Cape Wind drama, marking the release of the farm’s final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS).

The report is an exhaustive seal of approval of sorts, the final official analysis of how the wind project would likely affect its environment.

The federal Minerals Management Service assembled the report, an 800-page tome touching on every aspect of the wind farm - from expected effects on local economies and energy supply to its influence on bat and bird populations.

Adverse effects according to the report, would be mostly negligible or minor with a few moderate effects expected.

The Cape Wind project in Massachusetts cleared its biggest hurdle to date on Friday when the U.S. Minerals Management Service gave final environmental approval to the 450 megawatt offshore wind farm.

2008 was a banner year for sustainablog, and we want to end it as strongly as we started.  So, for the next twelve days, I’ll take a look back at some of the best and most memorable posts from the past year.

Let me start off, though, by expressing my immense gratitude to all of the writers who contributed during 2008. This was our first full year as a multi-author blog, and I couldn’t have been more pleased with the way it turned out. Some of the writers I’ll mention have moved on; others on coming on board. I’m grateful for the inspiration you’ve all brought to the blog over the past year, and look forward with anticipation to what the new year brings us.

January 2008

Like New Year’s fireworks, January started off with a bang.  Here are a few great posts to remember:

• Jason Phillip’s post on Chicago’s bottled water tax was one of our most popular ever… it’s still getting pageviews!
• Maria Surma Manka wrote a very thorough (and also very popular) review of Scientific American’s “Solar Grand Plan.”
• I took a look at an innovative South African whose developed a low-cost, high-yield method of generating energy from chicken poop.

As news broke late last week that there might be yet another delay in the eight year battle to get Cape Wind approved, I had to wonder if Kennedy’s hand was somehow behind it. And according to reports, that is at least plausible.

Minnesota Representative Jim Oberstar, a Democrat, has asked the United States Coast Guard to delay its final recommendations on the proposed Cape Wind project.

Agency permanently extends comment period for alt. energy leases

In the fall of 2001, Jim Gordon of Energy Management Inc. (EMI) announced his intentions to build a 420 megawatt wind farm off the coast of Massachusetts - the nation’s first. Now, the long permitting process that was made even longer by powerful opposition groups, is nearing resolution…finally.

More than 40,000 individuals and organizations have submitted comments on an environmental review of the wind farm proposed for Nantucket Sound, according to an article in the Cape Cod Times.

“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” said Rodney Cluck, Cape Wind project manager for the U.S. Minerals Management Service, the lead federal agency to review Cape Wind Associates’ plan to build 130 wind turbines in Nantucket Sound, off the coast of Massachusetts. Originally, the comments were set to be released last Friday, but officials at the Minerals Management Service postponed the release to give agency staffers more time to organize the overwhelming public response to the proposed wind farm.

As a result of the scoping process’ popularity, the MMS announced that they would be preemptively extending the comment period for all of the remaining “Alternative Energy Leases” from 30 to 60 days.

A recent survey (pdf) found that 87 percent of Massachusetts residents say they are now “more likely to support Cape Wind” in the wake of the recently issued draft environmental impact statement (EIS) that found no major environmental harms resulting from the project. It seems that the growing public consciousness of climate change is actually producing measurable shifts in the public mood. Time is clearly running out for Cape Wind opponents. And despite the recent 30-day extension of the public comment period granted by the U.S. Minerals Management Service (at the behest of the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound), it is my firm belief that this project will soon get the federal stamp of approval it has been seeking (to go along with the federal approval it already got back in 2004). In what should make for a pretty entertaining roadshow, the MMS is beginning a four-night run of public hearings starting on Monday March 10th in West Yarmouth, MA. The hearings will then rumble through Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard before concluding in Boston on March 13. If you are not lucky enough to attend, what will certainly be “spirited” events, you may submit an e-comment no later than April 21.