Sustainable Energy Law Notebook

After discussing in a previous message the prospects of offshore drilling along the U.S. coasts, I wanted to explore the problematic of offshore wind power development and understand the current barriers to its take-off in the U.S. A good start was Cape Wind by W. Williams and R. Whitcomb which tells the story of "America's first offshore wind mills." (See Cape Wind project website) The book opens on a 2001 public hearing meeting hold on a proposal to build a large electrical-generation project in the so-called "Nantucket Sound" area (Massachusetts, 150 km south Boston). The project is promoted by the company Cape Wind Associates and aims to install wind turbines along the coast of "Cape Cod," the elected area of the American east coast elite. Chapter 1 introduces some key characters: historian David McCullough, one of the strongest opponents to the project (but relatively absent in the rest of the book), and Jim Gordon, president of Cape Wind Associa...