Saving Seafood

‘Much uncertainty.’ Cape, Mass. leaders see political shifts that may slow offshore wind

January 6, 2025 — The future of offshore wind is at a pivotal point this year, marked by a mix of determination and uncertainty.

On Dec. 20, the Biden-Harris administration granted final approval for SouthCoast Wind, the eleventh offshore wind project it has approved. With up to 141 turbines and the potential to generate 2.4 gigawatts of electricity, the SouthCoast Wind project, in a federal lease area south of Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket, is a key part of the region’s clean energy goals steadfastly promoted by Gov. Maura Healey, and many legislators and environmental advocates.

But the incoming Trump-Vance administration could dramatically alter the regulatory and financial landscape for offshore wind. Their less favorable stance toward the industry raises concerns about the pace of future projects and the viability of less mature proposals. This is especially true for the Gulf of Maine lease areas, where the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has provisionally awarded four of eight lease areas to Avangrid Renewables and Invenergy NE Offshore Wind, including due east of Cape Cod.

Local concerns and political shifts

Those who have voiced concerns about offshore development, meanwhile, say a cooler federal stance on offshore wind would be welcome. Many critics, particularly on Cape Cod, say the offshore wind industry is advancing too quickly without adequate consultation with those who will be most affected — local residents, fishermen, and coastal communities.

Susanne Conley, a Barnstable resident who’s a leader of the Save Greater Dowses Beach citizens group, advocates for a reevaluation of offshore wind policy. While she supports the transition to renewable energy, she believes the Biden-Harris offshore wind program should be halted, particularly in light of what she perceives as insufficient baseline environmental data “to understand the effect of these massive projects on the fisheries, on all ocean life, and on coastal communities.”

Read the full story at The Standard-Times

Aquinnah tribe supports wind lawsuit

December 11, 2024 — The leader of the Martha’s Vineyard Native American tribe, and a tribal citizen who runs a popular charter fishing business, are supporting a lawsuit against a wind farm that is undergoing construction off Aquinnah’s coast.

The chair of the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah), Cheryl Andrews-Maltais, filed a declaration in federal district court in Washington, D.C., stating that the tribe has suffered as the result of the government’s actions approving Revolution Wind, a development under construction 12 miles from the Vineyard.

William (“Buddy”) Vanderhoop has filed a similar declaration; both read like witness statements. Vanderhoop said that the fishing grounds that he brings customers to have not been as productive as in prior years, and he worries about his business as a result.

Describing themselves as a grassroots organization, the Rhode Island group Green Oceans is alleging in the lawsuit filed at the beginning of this year that the federal government has violated a number of laws — including the Endangered Species and Clean Water acts — by approving the construction of Revolution Wind. Some 35 other plaintiffs are part of the lawsuit, including the Responsible Offshore Development Alliance and Save Right Whales Coalition.

Revolution Wind is expected to consist of 65 Siemens Gamesa turbines — which feature blades more than 300 feet long — with the capacity to generate up to 400 megawatts for Rhode Island and 304 megawatts for Connecticut, enough to power more than 350,000 homes.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management approved the wind farm in November last year.

But tribal members, including Andrews-Maltais, worry about the impact the offshore wind development is having on many significant cultural practices, the environment as well as wildlife in the area.

Read the full article at Martha Vineyard Times

Tracking Sea Creature Stress Related to Wind Turbine Construction

December 5, 2024 — With hundreds of towering offshore wind turbines planned to be built in the waters south of Martha’s Vineyard, a team of local scientists is working to find out if the construction noise will hurt ocean life.

As regulators consider projects up and down the east coast, researchers at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution have been simulating the booming sound of pile driving turbine monopiles to see if it has an effect on a variety of species. So far, results have been mixed.

While there’s been research into how turbine construction impacts the endangered right whale, the ocean’s small ground critters have largely been left to fend for themselves, said Aran Mooney, an associate scientist at WHOI.

“This is a knowledge gap, and it could really impact the fisheries,” he said.

The research team has been replicating construction and observing its effects on lobsters, sea scallops, flounder, squid and black sea bass. Mr. Mooney’s work was contracted by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, the federal agency that oversees offshore wind energy.

In the past few years, the WHOI scientists have determined the impact the noise has on squid by playing an audio recording of pile driving as they were enclosed in a tank.

“The sound profiles are pretty much the same as what we see in offshore wind, actual construction.” Mr. Mooney said.

Read the full story at the Vineyard Gazette

SouthCoast Wind clears federal environmental hurdle

November 13, 2024 — A 147-turbine offshore wind project planned off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard will not harm local species and habitat any more than climate change already is, according to a federal review published on Friday.

One exception: North Atlantic right whales, which could face “moderate adverse” direct and indirect impacts from the SouthCoast Wind project that would not otherwise exist, according to the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management’s report. The report specifically named vessel noise as potentially disruptive to marine mammals, especially fin and endangered right whales. However, it does not link these disruptions to whale deaths, a contention which has been largely debunked by scientists, including within the federal government. 

“There is no relationship between offshore wind and dead whales,” said Bob Kenney, an emeritus marine research scientist at the University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Oceanography.

The 2,400-page environmental impact statement on SouthCoast Wind marks a significant step — though not the final sign off — in the multilayered, multi-step regulatory process governing offshore wind. Project developers are still awaiting federal approval on a construction and operations plan — a date for which has not been set — alongside a host of state-level reviews, including several in Rhode Island.

Read the full article at the Rhode Island Current

MASSACHUSETTS: Nantucket evaluates economic, environmental fallout from turbine blade

October 10, 2024 — Three months after a blade from an offshore wind turbine near Martha’s Vineyard fell, Nantucket is addressing the failure’s economic and environmental impact.

“While our community is committed to doing our part to address climate change, we have had to confront the very real and lasting adverse impacts of offshore wind development,” the Nantucket Select Board wrote in a letter to the Cape island’s residents on Wednesday.

Read the full article at Mass Live

Wind power construction noise doesn’t destroy whale habitat, feds find

August 27, 2024 — The federal government issued a new “biological opinion” on the offshore wind power project off Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket, finding that pile-driving noise associated with Vineyard Wind 1 is likely to adversely affect, but not likely to jeopardize, the continued existence of whales, fish or sea turtles listed under the Endangered Species Act.

“It will have no effect on any designated critical habitat,” National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries said in a statement. “NOAA Fisheries does not anticipate serious injuries to or mortalities of any ESA listed whale including the North Atlantic right whale.” The agency said that with mitigation measures, “all effects to North Atlantic right whales will be limited to temporary behavioral disturbance.”

NOAA Fisheries said Friday it was issuing its new opinion to the “federal action agencies” including Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, which approved the Vineyard Wind 1 Project in 2021 and oversees offshore wind power development in federal lease areas.

Read the full story at WBUR

Fishermen stage floating protest at Vineyard Wind site

August 27, 2024 — As concerns mount over the July collapse of one Vineyard Wind turbine blade, a “flotilla” of about two dozen commercial and recreational fishing vessels steamed to the wind farm on Sunday to protest offshore wind development and its impact on the marine ecosystem.

The vessels, hoisting anti-offshore wind flags and blasting air horns, departed early Sunday morning from ports in New Bedford, Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard, Rhode Island and along the Cape, converging at about noon on the site of the crippled Vineyard Wind turbine.

“The blade collapse was an eye-opener to a lot of people who before didn’t know that offshore wind is a disaster for the ocean,” said Shawn Machie, 54, who is captain of the New Bedford scalloper F/V Capt. John.

On July 13, one of the three blades on turbine AW38 sustained damage while undergoing testing. Five days later, a 300-foot section of the blade collapsed into the water leaving fiberglass debris floating in fishing grounds and scattered across beaches, mostly on Nantucket. It marked an inflection point as the first industrial energy incident in this era of offshore wind development in waters off the Northeast coast.

Read the full story at The New Bedford Light

MASSACHUSETTS: Debris from broken Vineyard Wind blade confirmed on Hyannis beach

August 26, 2024 — Vineyard Wind has confirmed that debris from its broken GE Vernova-made turbine blade was recently recovered from the shore in Hyannisport.

The town of Barnstable on Thursday released an advisory about pieces of foam debris “which were reported through the Vineyard Wind debris reporting hotline.”

Vineyard Wind spokesperson Craig Gilvarg on Friday noted that “in the initial report, roughly five small pieces were found by a resident and reported to the town of Barnstable.”

“As part of its debris recovery efforts, Vineyard Wind dispatched a crew to patrol the area, and no additional debris was found,” he said in an email. “We are coordinating with local officials, including any required shorebird monitoring personnel, to respond to any additional reports we receive.”

Read the full article at Yahoo! News

A boat flotilla in protest of Vineyard Wind

August 28, 2024 — A group of approximately 15 to 20 boats descended on the Vineyard Wind project site on Sunday afternoon in a show of peaceful protest against the offshore wind industry.

The group, composed of commercial fishermen and concerned citizens, have been energized by the recent failure of a turbine blade that fractured and fell into the ocean, washing ashore debris including fiberglass and foam on Nantucket and Island beaches.

The “flotilla,” as it was called, was organized by the New England Fisherman’s Stewardship Organization (NEFSA), a fishing industry alliance that has said its frustrations and concerns surrounding offshore wind have not been answered by Vineyard Wind or local officials.

Vineyard Wind is building the nation’s first utility-scale offshore wind project, and has been met with significant resistance by both commercial fishermen and locals who are wary about the potential effects of large wind turbines on marine life, fisherman’s livelihoods and on the impacts to their views. The turbines stand as high as 837 feet, with blades as long as a football field. Following the recent blade failure, Vineyard Wind has been forced to halt construction while federal officials conduct an investigation.

Construction on the project has resumed, though Vineyard Wind is not allowed to generate power. GE Vernova, the renewable energy subsidiary of General Electric that manufactures the turbines, has been conducting extensive examinations of the blades to determine the root cause of the failure, and says it will use new algorithms to monitor the health of blades in real-time.

Read the full article at MV Times

Fishermen organizing ‘flotilla’ protest against offshore wind

August 23, 2024 — In response to recent concerns over offshore wind and with debris washing up on Nantucket and Island beaches from a fractured turbine blade, the New England Fisherman’s Stewardship Association (NEFSA) has organized a “flotilla” for this Sunday, bringing fishing boats together to peacefully protest in unison against the offshore wind industry.

Boats will be joining together in a “boat parade” from various areas of the east coast, said NEFSA founder and CEO Jerry Leeman, including the Vineyard, Nantucket, parts of Massachusetts, Rhode Island and potentially New Jersey.

Read the full article at MV Times