First Federal Approval Confirmed For Cape Wind Project From Minerals Management Service - NYT

BOSTON — A federal agency said Friday that the nation’s first offshore wind farm, proposed for the waters off Cape Cod, posed no serious environmental threat, bringing it a major step closer to fruition. Homeowners and boaters on the cape, including Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, have fought the project for eight years, saying it would hurt wildlife, fishing and tourism and spoil the beauty of Nantucket Sound.

Opponents have sued to stop the project, known as Cape Wind, and more challenges are certain, keeping the path to construction bumpy despite what supporters on Friday called a crucial victory.

The Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound, a group formed to fight the project, suggested that the Bush administration had unscrupulously rushed to approve it before President-elect Barack Obama takes office next week. “They wanted some kind of a legacy,” said Audra Parker, the group’s executive director. “Cape Wind is far from a done deal, despite this favorable report.”

The federal agency that released the final environmental impact statement on Friday, the Minerals Management Service, is a division of the Department of Interior. The wind farm would cover 24 square miles — roughly the size of Manhattan — five miles off Cape Cod. From the shore, the 130 turbines, each 440 feet tall, will be visible half an inch above the horizon on clear days, according to Energy Management Inc., the company planning the project. Jim Gordon, the company’s president, said that optimistically, construction could begin late this year, and that the wind farm could be producing electricity by the end of 2011.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/17/us/17wind.html?_r=1