Feds Approve Cape Wind Project

In a joint press conference today with Governor Deval Patrick at the Massachusetts State House, U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar said his department has approved a scaled-down version of the long-delayed Cape Wind project at Horseshoe Shoal in Nantucket Sound. Salazar said that the revised project approved by the department will consist of 130 wind turbines rather than 170, that the turbines will be moved farther away from Nantucket Island than originally proposed, and that additional seabed surveys will be conducted before construction to ensure that any as-yet-undiscovered submerged archaeological resources are protected. Some of the changes were made specifically to reduce the visual impact of the wind farm from the Kennedy family compound in Hyannisport; deceased Massachusetts Senator Edward Kennedy was a longtime opponent of the project. The wind farm, first proposed in 2001 by private developer Cape Wind Associates, is expected to supply enough power for Nantucket Island, Martha’s Vineyard, and much of Cape Cod and create several hundred construction jobs. “This will be the first of many projects up and down the Atlantic coast,” Salazar said at the press conference.

Author: Wade Roush

Between 2007 and 2014, I was a staff editor for Xconomy in Boston and San Francisco. Since 2008 I've been writing a weekly opinion/review column called VOX: The Voice of Xperience. (From 2008 to 2013 the column was known as World Wide Wade.) I've been writing about science and technology professionally since 1994. Before joining Xconomy in 2007, I was a staff member at MIT’s Technology Review from 2001 to 2006, serving as senior editor, San Francisco bureau chief, and executive editor of TechnologyReview.com. Before that, I was the Boston bureau reporter for Science, managing editor of supercomputing publications at NASA Ames Research Center, and Web editor at e-book pioneer NuvoMedia. I have a B.A. in the history of science from Harvard College and a PhD in the history and social study of science and technology from MIT. I've published articles in Science, Technology Review, IEEE Spectrum, Encyclopaedia Brittanica, Technology and Culture, Alaska Airlines Magazine, and World Business, and I've been a guest of NPR, CNN, CNBC, NECN, WGBH and the PBS NewsHour. I'm a frequent conference participant and enjoy opportunities to moderate panel discussions and on-stage chats. My personal site: waderoush.com My social media coordinates: Twitter: @wroush Facebook: facebook.com/wade.roush LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/waderoush Google+ : google.com/+WadeRoush YouTube: youtube.com/wroush1967 Flickr: flickr.com/photos/wroush/ Pinterest: pinterest.com/waderoush/