GLOBE EDITORIAL
Waiting for Cape WindTHE ENVIRONMENTAL jury is still out on the proposed wind farm in Nantucket Sound, but two agencies -- one federal and one state -- left no doubt last week that the region needs the electricity that the 130 windmill towers would produce. The reports should encourage Governor Romney to rethink his opposition to the nearly $700 million project.
Both the US Department of Energy and the staff of the state Energy Facilities Siting Board have concluded that continued reliability of the region's power supply depends on renewable sources like this, which would also protect consumers from the volatile prices of natural gas, a fuel that accounts for an increasing share of the state's power. The Department of Energy report is part of the overall environmental impact assessment being compiled by the Army Corps of Engineers, the permitting authority for the Cape Wind project. That assessment will also have to weigh alternative locations and look at any detrimental impact the 417-foot towers spread over 24 square miles would have on migratory birds, fish, navigation, recreational boating, and the scenic qualities of the sound. If those impacts are shown to be manageable or negligible, the benefit the windmills would provide to the region's electric grid without emitting an ounce of pollution or greenhouse gases makes a strong case for regulatory approvals. In granting tentative approval for underground transmission lines from the wind farm to a switching station in Barnstable, the staff of the state siting board found that "the power from the wind farm is needed on reliability and economic grounds." Increasingly, the state is putting its electricity eggs in one basket -- natural gas. In 1980, gas, which is cleaner than coal or oil, produced less than 1 percent of the state's power. Its share is now 41 percent and will be 49 percent by 2010. That makes consumers, many of whom also use natural gas for heating, dangerously vulnerable to price hikes. According to the Energy Department study, one full year of Cape Wind operation would free up enough natural gas for the heating and hot water needs of 110,000 homes.
The state and federal agencies that are assessing Cape Wind are doing so in a flawed regulatory framework. Congress should have long since created a process in which developers like Cape Wind would bid for the right to build on public water, much as oil companies bid for the right to drill offshore. But it would be a mistake to hold this project hostage until Congress acts, with pollution worsening and global warming raising sea levels and eroding Cape Cod beaches. The state needs energy sources other than fossil fuels. Romney should heed last week's reports and stop opposing this pollution-free way of meeting that need until regulators have judged its environmental impact. © Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.
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