America’s only offshore wind farm is the 30-megawatt Block Island Wind Farm, a set of five 600-foot tall wind turbines located about four miles southeast of Block Island, Rhode Island. Construction began in May 2015 and the farm began producing power in December 2016, allowing the island to draw power from another source besides their expensive diesel generator.
With the National Renewable Energy Laboratory estimating that U.S. coastal waters have approximately 4,000 gigawatts of offshore wind energy resources (if all the resources over the waters from the shore out to 50 nautical miles out are included), the U.S. offshore wind energy business is set to boom, with several large projects due to break ground in 2019 and 2020—for example, an 800-megawatt farm (100 turbines) 14 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, and a 400-megawatt farm (50 turbines) 15 miles south of the Rhode Island coast. The Block Island Wind Farm is an interesting testing ground, then, to study the controversial aspects of offshore wind farms, such as their vulnerability to hurricanes, and their impacts on local fishing.
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When will these fools look at existing wind farms around the world to see how much of a failure they are?
ReplyDeleteCan you explain 7:29 ?
DeleteI think this week, the east coast could have supplied energy to the entire country, as windy as its been.
ReplyDeleteWind turbines kill a lot of birds,the rise and fall of the tides would be a much better and safer power source and probably cheaper and certainly much more predictable.
ReplyDeleteNever will work
ReplyDelete11:23
ReplyDeleteYes. Look at Australia where the use of wind and solar have led to a very unstable grid and blackouts.
Look at Germany where they are decommissioning wind farms wholesale and reclaiming the sites they once stood.
Look at the New York thruway authority that is suing the wind turbine company because after only a few years the turbines have failed and are no longer functioning.
Wake up. The wind turbines never break even for the cost and are not environmentally friendly.